Fort Dodge, Kansas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
Crops well matched to these conditions include cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — though what thrives on any one site still turns on its specific soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Fort Dodge, 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 Fort Dodge 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 Fort Dodge — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Fort Dodge — the short answer
Fort Dodge, Kansas: USDA zone 6b, about 204 days between hard freezes, across 117 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 7
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 28
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~204
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 117 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 Fort Dodge's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Fort Dodge's 204-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Fort Dodge
Each reading below is measured for Fort Dodge itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredFort Dodge runs about 204 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
MeasuredFort Dodge 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 Fort Dodge is in
Fort Dodge sits in the Central Great Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Fort Dodge's own centroid rather than borrowed from Ford County.
What Grows in Fort Dodge
Every plant below cleared Fort Dodge's own zone 6b and its 204-day season. Each card opens that plant's Kansas profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Fort Dodge?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 10; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 7 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 28 — 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 Fort Dodge
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Fort Dodge. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- KANSAS SOLDIERS HOMEBrownfields · 500 ft
- KANSAS SOLDIERS HOMEUnderground Storage Tanks · 700 ft
- 27S 24W 03BAA 01Nitrate · 1300 ft
- 27S 24W 04ABC 01Nitrate · 0.7 mi
- FORT DODGE STATIONBrownfields · 0.8 mi
- JUDSON LARGE STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- 27S 24W 04CAA 01Nitrate · 1.0 mi
- 27S 24W 03CDD 01Nitrate · 1.0 mi
- 27S 24W 03DCC 01Nitrate · 1.0 mi
- WILROADS FEED YARDCAFO · 1.1 mi
- CARGILL MEAT SOLUTIONS CORPBrownfields · 1.1 mi
- CARGILL MEAT SOLUTIONS CORPToxics Release Inventory · 1.1 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Fort Dodge'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 Fort Dodge.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Fort Dodge
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Fort Dodge
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Fort Dodge, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Fort Dodge — CAFO (8 sites) and Superfund (7 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check your specific parcel in Fort Dodge
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 Fort Dodge average
Your land is one point inside Fort Dodge
Everything above resolves to Fort Dodge as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 117 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 town 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 Fort Dodge Average
Fort Dodge Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Fort Dodge
- ●One soil character for all of Fort Dodge
- ●Frost dates read at Fort Dodge's scale: Apr 7 to Oct 28
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Fort Dodge's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Fort Dodge
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Fort Dodge, Kansas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Fort Dodge averages can't show:
We read public map data around Fort Dodge — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Fort Dodge average
How we know this about Fort Dodge
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this town’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at Fort Dodge’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 town grain anywhere on this page — there is no town-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 Fort Dodge
When does frost risk typically end in Fort Dodge?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Fort Dodge typically lands around Apr 7, 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 28.
When is the first frost in Fort Dodge?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Fort Dodge typically arrives around Oct 28, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 14, so the watching starts about Sep 28 — about 204 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Fort Dodge?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Fort Dodge sees about 204 frost-free days — roughly Apr 7 through Oct 28, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 28 to Oct 14, about 169 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Fort Dodge?
The federal record around Fort Dodge is a meaningful one — 370 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (126), the nearest Brownfields record under a tenth of a mile out — so a soil test before new food beds is a sensible precaution here, not a reason to hold back from growing. Remember that proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what sits where.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Fort Dodge?
From about Sep 28 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 Oct 28 (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 Oct 28. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Fort Dodge's scale — its 6b band and its 204-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Fort Dodge'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 Fort Dodge’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Fort Dodge's own scale — its own ~204-day season between 28°F freezes, the 117 acres it covers and 370 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Fort Dodge's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Fort Dodge's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 7 and Oct 28 and the ~204-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 370 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Fort Dodge, the closest Brownfields record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Fort Dodge's boundary and the 117 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~204-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Fort Dodge's own centroid, the Central Great PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Fort Dodge's 117 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Ford County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Ford 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 Ford County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Fort Dodge's 117 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Fort Dodge you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 117 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields 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 Fort Dodge-wide figureread your own land →
More in Kansas
Wider growing context
What grows across KansasFort Dodge sits outside our named growing regions, so Kansas as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides