Elk Falls, Kansas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Expect cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens to be strong candidates here; the deciding factors on any one parcel stay local — soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Elk Falls, 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 Elk Falls 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 Elk Falls — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Elk Falls — the short answer
Elk Falls, Kansas: USDA zone 7a, about 221 days between hard freezes, across 465 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 30
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 6
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~221
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 465 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 7a is Elk Falls's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Elk Falls's 221-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Elk Falls
Each reading below is measured for Elk Falls itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredElk Falls 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
MeasuredElk Falls sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a.
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 Elk Falls is in
Elk Falls sits in the Flint Hills — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Elk Falls's own centroid rather than borrowed from Elk County.
What Grows in Elk Falls
Every plant below cleared Elk Falls's own zone 7a and its 221-day season. Each card opens that plant's Kansas profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Elk Falls?
Too late for some crops, right on time for others — a growing season is a sequence, not a deadline. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 2; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 30 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 6 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Here the season winds down slowly: late sowings, a real autumn harvest, and garlic in the ground before the first hard freeze.
What's on the federal record near Elk Falls
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Elk Falls. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- TERRYS SERVICEUnderground Storage Tanks · 850 ft
- ELK FALLS GASUnderground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- SHORT STOP #15Underground Storage Tanks · 2.6 mi
- 30S 11E 26BBC 01Nitrate · 2.9 mi
- 30S 12E 31DC 01Nitrate · 3.4 mi
- 31S 11E 26CCC 01Nitrate · 4.0 mi
- 31S 11E 34ABA 01Nitrate · 4.0 mi
- 31S 12E 09BC 01Nitrate · 4.8 mi
- M.J. MURPHY OIL CO, LLCUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.4 mi
- MURPHY OIL CO INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.6 mi
- MOLINE """"Q"""" MARTUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.7 mi
- MOLINE Q MARTUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.1 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Elk Falls'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 Elk Falls.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Elk Falls
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Elk Falls
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Elk Falls, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 34 sites within ~10 miles of Elk Falls. That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Elk Falls
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 Elk Falls average
Your land is one point inside Elk Falls
Everything above resolves to Elk Falls as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 465 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 Elk Falls Average
Elk Falls Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Elk Falls
- ●One soil character for all of Elk Falls
- ●Frost dates read at Elk Falls's scale: Mar 30 to Nov 6
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Elk Falls's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Elk Falls
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Elk Falls, Kansas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Elk Falls averages can't show:
We read public map data around Elk Falls — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Elk Falls average
How we know this about Elk Falls
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 Elk Falls’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 Elk Falls
When does frost risk typically end in Elk Falls?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Elk Falls typically lands around Mar 30, 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 20.
When is the first frost in Elk Falls?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Elk Falls typically arrives around Nov 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 23, so the watching starts about Oct 7 — about 221 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Elk Falls?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Elk Falls sees about 221 frost-free days — roughly Mar 30 through Nov 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 20 to Oct 23, about 186 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Elk Falls?
The federal record around Elk Falls shows 54 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (34), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles 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 Elk Falls?
From about Oct 7 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 6 (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 6. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Elk Falls's scale — its 7a band and its 221-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Elk Falls'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 Elk Falls’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Elk Falls's own scale — its own ~221-day season between 28°F freezes, the 465 acres it covers and 54 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Elk Falls's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Elk Falls's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 30 and Nov 6 and the ~221-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 54 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Elk Falls, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Elk Falls's boundary and the 465 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~221-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Elk Falls's own centroid, the Flint HillsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Elk Falls's 465 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Elk County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Elk 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 Elk County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Elk Falls's 465 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Elk Falls you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 465 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles 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 Elk Falls-wide figureread your own land →
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