Osceola County, in Michigan, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
A short list that earns its place here — cabbage, cranberry, lavender, and collard greens — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Osceola County lies within the Northern Lower Michigan ("Up North") — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Osceola County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Osceola County, so your frost dates and drainage aren't the county average. 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 Osceola County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Osceola County — the short answer
Osceola County, Michigan: USDA zone 5a, about 148 days between hard freezes, across 362K acres.
- USDA zone
- 5a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- May 10
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 5
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~148
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 362K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are county 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 5a is Osceola County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Osceola County's 148-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Osceola County
Across a year, Osceola County accumulates about 1,815 growing degree days above 50°F, about 285 fewer than the middle Michigan county — ahead of 27 of Michigan’s 83 counties. Degree days are the heat a crop actually gets to work with — more of them is more room to ripen a long-season crop before the freeze closes the window.
Grounded in PRISM Climate Group, Oregon State University — 1991–2020 monthly normals
Soil in Osceola County
Across Osceola County, the ground is predominantly Spodosols, where Montcalm, Kalkaska, and Nester are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a sand surface. Topsoil pH runs about 5.5–6.1, moderately acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group A soils.
Soil order
Spodosols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
6%
Hydric soils
17%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Osceola County
The USDA soil survey maps 39% of Osceola County as well drained — but another 59% drains differently: 21% somewhat excessively drained, 13% very poorly drained.
Montcalm is the most extensive named soil at 17% of mapped acres, then Kalkaska (13%) and Nester (7%).
Which of them your own lot sits on is a parcel question, not a county one. Check your address for the survey at your boundary.
What this means for growing in Osceola County
Each reading below is measured for Osceola County itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Drainage
MeasuredThe dominant soils across Osceola County are well drained, in hydrologic group A — ground that drains quickly.
The upside is soil you can work early in spring and roots that never drown; the cost is that fast-draining ground dries out fast and leaches nutrients away before plants can use them.
Work in compost and mulch to hold moisture and feed, and water more often in short doses than deep and rarely.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Osceola County runs about pH 5.5–6.1, on the acidic side.
Blueberries, potatoes, and rhododendrons thrive in it, but most vegetables start locking out nutrients below about pH 6.0 and grow pale and stunted no matter how much you feed them.
A measured lime application raises pH for the crops that need it — but test first, because the right rate depends on your own soil, not the county average.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Wet ground
MeasuredAbout 17% of Osceola County is mapped as hydric — wetland — soil.
If your lot falls in one of those pockets, a standard in-ground bed will fight waterlogging all season, and roots that need air will struggle.
Check how your own ground drains before you dig; raised beds or moisture-loving plantings turn a wet corner from a problem into a niche.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredOsceola County runs about 148 days between hard freezes — a short growing season.
Long-maturing crops like melons, sweet potatoes, and winter squash can run out of runway before the first hard freeze, ripening late or not at all.
Lead with fast-maturing varieties, and stretch the season on both ends with cold frames, low tunnels, or a greenhouse.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
The kind of country Osceola County is in
Osceola County sits in the Northern Lakes and Forests — EPA Level III, inside the wider Northern Forests. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Osceola County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Osceola County's own USDA zone 5a and its own 148-day season between hard freezes, using the same matching engine that runs a full parcel report. These cleared both. Sun, soil pH and drainage vary lot by lot — those are the parcel questions below. Each card opens that plant's Michigan profile.
Is it too late to plant in Osceola County?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. Cool-season crops can go in from around Apr 12; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near May 10 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 5 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. In a season this compact, fast finishers and cold-hardy greens do the late work, and garlic tucked in before the freeze repays you next summer.
Documented around Osceola County
- monarch butterfly236 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Osceola County
USGS estimates 10,590 lb of Glyphosate on Osceola County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of 2,4-d (3,700 lb) and Atrazine (1,813 lb).
Farmland across the whole county, not any one lot. Check your address for the site-by-site record.
Safe to Grow Here?
What the federal record shows across Osceola County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Osceola County — 200 documented sites across 6 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 2 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed). Sites tracked in EPA's Superfund program — from assessment-stage CERCLIS entries to confirmed National Priorities List cleanup sites.
There's a meaningful federal record across Osceola County — worth a look before you plant food, not a reason to hold back from growing. Proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. A soil test before new food beds is the sensible precaution here, and the map shows exactly which sites sit where, so you can see what's actually near you.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Osceola County
Closest first, across Osceola County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- At & T - Evart, MiUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.7 mi
- Osceola County Road CommissionUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.8 mi
- Mdot- Marion Maintenance GarageUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.0 mi
- MI DEPT/TRANSPORTATIONBrownfields · 6.1 mi
- Pineview HomesUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.3 mi
- The Dighton StoreUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.4 mi
- Evart Municipal AirportUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.9 mi
- Gambles Redi Mix IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.9 mi
- VICTORY CIRCLE QUICKLUBEBrownfields · 6.9 mi
- SPECTRUM HEALTHBrownfields · 7.0 mi
- City Of EvartUnderground Storage Tanks · 7.0 mi
- East Leroy Variety StoreUnderground Storage Tanks · 7.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Osceola County'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 Osceola County.
Total Sites
200
across Osceola County
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
2 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
across Osceola County
Severity Distribution
across Osceola County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Osceola County, Toxics Release Inventory runs higher than the national average — 13 sites across Osceola County. Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Osceola County
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 Osceola County average
Your land is one point inside Osceola County
Everything above resolves to Osceola County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 362K 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 county 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 county average.
Your Lot vs the Osceola County Average
Osceola County Average
- ●USDA Zones 5a, averaged across Osceola County
- ●One soil character for all of Osceola County
- ●Frost dates read at Osceola County's scale: May 10 to Oct 5
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Osceola County's 5a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Osceola County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Osceola County, Michigan — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Osceola County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Osceola County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Osceola County average
How we know this about Osceola County
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at county grain; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at this county’s own record where one resolves, and the labelled statewide window where none does; soils from the USDA NRCS SSURGO survey, area-weighted across the county’s own map units; boundaries and acreage from US Census TIGER/Line 2025; the contamination and pesticide records from the federal sources named in their beats above. Where Osceola County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Osceola County
When does frost risk typically end in Osceola County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Osceola County typically lands around May 10, 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 May 31.
How long is the growing season in Osceola County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Osceola County sees about 148 frost-free days — roughly May 10 through Oct 5, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 31 to Sep 21, about 113 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Osceola County?
The federal record around Osceola County is a meaningful one — 200 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (112), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 3.7 miles 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 gardeners stretch the season in Osceola County?
With about 148 frost-free days between hard freezes, Osceola County rewards the classic extension moves: floating row cover buys roughly two to four extra weeks at each shoulder — on this season that is a working window nearer 176 to 204 days — and cold frames or low tunnels buy more. Starting transplants indoors ahead of the May 10 hard-freeze normal stretches the season without touching the calendar.
Everything above is measured at Osceola County's scale — its 5a band and its 148-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Osceola County's numbers: we read soil, sun, drainage and frost at your exact address. Try it for 14 days — no card required.
Will It Grow Here?
Zone fit is the first question — each answer below reads Michigan's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Osceola County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Osceola County's own scale — its own ~148-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 200 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Osceola County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Osceola County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~148-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Osceola CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 200 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 3.7 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Osceola County's boundary and the 362,426 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5a and a ~148-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Osceola County sitting wholly inside the Northern Lakes and ForestsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Osceola County for a tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Osceola County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Michigan grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Michigan
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Osceola County — the ~148 days above is one reading at its centre; the 12 towns below each carry their owntowns in this county →
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Osceola County's 362,426 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 200 documented sites actually reaches your soil — that needs your address, the wind, and the groundwater directionhow we read the record →
- Where cold air settles, which slopes face the sun, and which way the wind runs on your own ground — none of it survives being averaged over Osceola Countyread your own land →