Elbing, Kansas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
On paper, cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Even in Elbing, no two yards are alike.
A low spot, a south-facing slope, or a stand of trees moves the frost date and sun across a single Elbing lot. Enter your address and we'll score 1,086 plants against your land's actual soil, sun, and frost.
We read public map data around Elbing — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Elbing — the short answer
Elbing, Kansas: USDA zone 6b, about 221 days between hard freezes, across 113 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 1
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 8
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~221
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 113 acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are this town’s own 28°F normals: light frosts run a few weeks past them, and tender transplants usually wait 2–3 weeks after the last hard freeze.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 6b is Elbing's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Elbing's 221-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Elbing
Each reading below is measured for Elbing itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredElbing runs about 221 days between hard freezes — a long growing season.
There is slack for succession plantings and slow-finishing crops: many vegetables can be sown twice, and the heat-lovers have time to ripen fully.
Plan a second sowing of quick crops after the first comes out, and use the fall window most gardeners let sit idle.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredElbing sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b.
The zone sets which perennials, shrubs, and fruit trees live through an average winter here — a plant rated for a colder zone is a safe bet, one rated warmer needs winter protection or gets treated as an annual.
Match perennials and fruit to the zone before you buy, so nothing you plant is a gamble against the cold.
USDA PHZM 2023
The kind of country Elbing is in
Elbing sits in the Central Great Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Elbing's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Butler County is mostly Flint Hills. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Elbing
Every plant below cleared Elbing's own zone 6b and its 221-day season. Each card opens that plant's Kansas profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Elbing?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 4; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 1 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 8 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. A long window like this one runs successions deep into fall — and even its last weeks take quick greens and garlic.
What's on the federal record near Elbing
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Elbing. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- 23S 03E 17BAC 01Nitrate · 450 ft
- 23S 03E 17BAD 01Nitrate · 550 ft
- EPP'S SERVICE, INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 700 ft
- 23S 03E 17BDC 01Nitrate · 950 ft
- 23S 03E 17BDD 01Nitrate · 1000 ft
- 23S 03E 17ACC 01Nitrate · 1400 ft
- 23S 03E 18AAD 01Nitrate · 2200 ft
- 23S 03E 17CCD 01Nitrate · 0.7 mi
- 23S 03E 08CBB 01Nitrate · 0.8 mi
- 23S 03E 07CDD 01Nitrate · 0.9 mi
- 23S 03E 20CBB 01Nitrate · 1.3 mi
- 23S 03E 06BAA 01Nitrate · 2.3 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Elbing's center, not your beds. Run your own address for what's upwind of you specifically.
Environmental Intelligence
The counts behind that headline — every source type on the record near Elbing.
Total Sites
150
within ~10 miles of Elbing
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
1 Toxics Release Inventory facility
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Elbing
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Elbing
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Elbing, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Elbing — CAFO (10 sites) and Nitrate (108 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Elbing
Get exact proximity distances to contamination sources for your specific parcel — plus soil, sun, drainage, and 1,086 plant recommendations.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Elbing average
Your land is one point inside Elbing
Everything above resolves to Elbing as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 113 acres. Your parcel is one point inside that footprint. Slope, tree cover, a low spot that pools cold air, and what is in the soil are all resolved at the address, and none of them are visible at city scale. That is the honest boundary of this page, and the reason the next step is a reading of your own ground rather than a better local average.
Your Lot vs the Elbing Average
Elbing Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Elbing
- ●One soil character for all of Elbing
- ●Frost dates read at Elbing's scale: Apr 1 to Nov 8
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Elbing's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Elbing
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Elbing, Kansas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Elbing averages can't show:
We read public map data around Elbing — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Elbing average
How we know this about Elbing
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this city’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at Elbing’s own record; boundaries and acreage from US Census TIGER/Line 2025; the contamination records from the federal sources named in their beats above. Soil is not read at city grain anywhere on this page — there is no city-resolution survey in our data, which is why you will find no soil grid here rather than a statewide one wearing a local label. The resolution ledger below names every figure this page inherited.
Common questions about Elbing
When does frost risk typically end in Elbing?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Elbing typically lands around Apr 1, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — earlier than the light-frost dates most charts quote. That marks the hard freeze, not the last light frost — lighter frosts keep biting past it, which is why tender transplants here wait until about Apr 22.
When is the first frost in Elbing?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Elbing typically arrives around Nov 8, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 25, so the watching starts about Oct 9 — about 221 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Elbing?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Elbing sees about 221 frost-free days — roughly Apr 1 through Nov 8, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 22 to Oct 25, about 186 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Elbing?
The federal record around Elbing shows 150 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (108), the nearest Nitrate record under a tenth of a mile out — a typical footprint for a growing area, and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. It's worth seeing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and testing the soil before new food beds near any of them.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Elbing?
From about Oct 9 the job here turns from planting to protecting — the last start even a 30-day crop can finish. As the season closes around the first 28°F hard freeze near Nov 8 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals), three moves buy time: row cover or an old sheet over tender plants on still, clear nights; water the soil the afternoon before a freeze, so it holds warmth overnight; and harvest tomatoes, peppers and basil before Nov 8. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Elbing's scale — its 6b band and its 221-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Elbing's numbers: we read soil, sun, drainage and frost at your exact address. Try it for 14 days — no card required.
What this page reads at Elbing’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Elbing's own scale — its own ~221-day season between 28°F freezes, the 113 acres it covers and 150 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Elbing's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Elbing's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 1 and Nov 8 and the ~221-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 150 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Elbing, the closest Nitrate record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Elbing's boundary and the 113 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~221-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Elbing sits in the Central Great Plains — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Elbing's 113 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Butler County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Butler County
- The growing challenges every Kansas grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Kansas
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Butler County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Elbing's 113 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Elbing you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 113 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate record under a tenth of a mile out, measured from the town centrehow we read the record →
- Where cold air settles, which slopes face the sun, and which way the wind runs on your own ground — measured at your address, and averaged away by any Elbing-wide figureread your own land →
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