Walnut, Kansas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
These conditions suit cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens — a starting list any specific site will trim or extend with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Walnut, 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 Walnut 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 Walnut — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Walnut — the short answer
Walnut, Kansas: USDA zone 7a, about 226 days between hard freezes, across 943 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 27
- 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
- ~226
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 943 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 Walnut's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Walnut's 226-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Walnut
Each reading below is measured for Walnut itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredWalnut runs about 226 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
MeasuredWalnut 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 Walnut is in
Walnut sits in the Central Irregular Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Walnut's own centroid rather than borrowed from Crawford County.
What Grows in Walnut
Every plant below cleared Walnut's own zone 7a and its 226-day season. Each card opens that plant's Kansas profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Walnut?
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 Feb 27; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 27 (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 Walnut
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Walnut. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- SEVART SERVICE STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 950 ft
- WALNUT R REPEATER STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- FORT SCOTT, CITY OFPFAS · 1.1 mi
- BOURBON CO RWD 2CPFAS · 1.1 mi
- 28S 22E 20CC 03Nitrate · 2.5 mi
- 28S 22E 20CC 04Nitrate · 2.5 mi
- 28S 22E 20CC 02Nitrate · 2.5 mi
- 28S 21E 34DD 01Nitrate · 3.1 mi
- 28S 21E 29AA 01Nitrate · 3.1 mi
- 28S 22E 21CCC 01Nitrate · 3.4 mi
- 28S 21E 05B 01Nitrate · 4.4 mi
- 28S 21E 05BB 01Nitrate · 4.6 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Walnut'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 Walnut.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Walnut
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Walnut
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Walnut, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 28 sites within ~10 miles of Walnut. Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
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 Walnut
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 Walnut average
Your land is one point inside Walnut
Everything above resolves to Walnut as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 943 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 Walnut Average
Walnut Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Walnut
- ●One soil character for all of Walnut
- ●Frost dates read at Walnut's scale: Mar 27 to Nov 8
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Walnut's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Walnut
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Walnut, Kansas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Walnut averages can't show:
We read public map data around Walnut — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Walnut average
How we know this about Walnut
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 Walnut’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 Walnut
When does frost risk typically end in Walnut?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Walnut typically lands around Mar 27, 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 17.
When is the first frost in Walnut?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Walnut 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 226 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Walnut?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Walnut sees about 226 frost-free days — roughly Mar 27 through Nov 8, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 17 to Oct 25, about 191 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Walnut?
The federal record around Walnut shows 53 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (28), 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 Walnut?
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 Walnut's scale — its 7a band and its 226-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Walnut'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 Walnut’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Walnut's own scale — its own ~226-day season between 28°F freezes, the 943 acres it covers and 53 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Walnut's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Walnut's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 27 and Nov 8 and the ~226-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 53 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Walnut, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Walnut's boundary and the 943 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~226-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Walnut's own centroid, the Central Irregular PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Walnut's 943 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Crawford County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Crawford 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 Crawford County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Walnut's 943 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Walnut you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 943 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 Walnut-wide figureread your own land →