Lac qui Parle County, in Minnesota, sits in USDA hardiness zone 4b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
On paper, cabbage, cranberry, turkish rocket, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Lac qui Parle County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Lac qui Parle 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 Lac qui Parle County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Lac qui Parle County — the short answer
Lac qui Parle County, Minnesota: USDA zone 4b, about 175 days between hard freezes, across 490K acres.
- USDA zone
- 4b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 20
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 12
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~175
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 490K 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 4b is Lac qui Parle County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Lac qui Parle County's 175-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Lac qui Parle County
Across a year, Lac qui Parle County accumulates about 2,413 growing degree days above 50°F, about 148 more than the middle Minnesota county — ahead of 71 of Minnesota’s 87 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 Lac qui Parle County
Across Lac qui Parle County, the ground is predominantly Mollisols, where Amiret, Glencoe, and Harps are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally poorly drained with a loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 7.0–7.6, neutral. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C/D soils.
Soil order
Mollisols
Drainage
Poorly drained
Prime farmland
42%
Hydric soils
42%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Lac qui Parle County
The USDA soil survey maps 35% of Lac qui Parle County as poorly drained — but another 63% drains differently: 33% well drained, 19% moderately well drained.
Amiret is the most extensive named soil at 8% of mapped acres, then Glencoe (5%) and Harps (4%).
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 Lac qui Parle County
Each reading below is measured for Lac qui Parle 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 Lac qui Parle County are poorly drained, in hydrologic group C/D — ground that sheds water slowly.
Beds can stay saturated for days after heavy rain, and the roots of most vegetables, berries, and fruit trees suffocate or rot in soil that never drains.
Raised beds or mounded rows lift roots above the wet zone; choose water-tolerant crops for the lowest spots.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Lac qui Parle County runs about pH 7.0–7.6, close to neutral.
This is the range most vegetables prefer — one correction you probably do not have to make, which is genuinely good news for a new bed.
Keep it there with compost rather than lime or sulfur, and only amend if your own soil test says otherwise.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredLac qui Parle County runs about 175 days between hard freezes — a moderate growing season.
There is room for the full run of cool-season crops plus a warm-season main crop, but the calendar is tight enough that a late spring or early fall frost still decides how much finishes.
Time warm-season transplants to your last hard freeze, and a few weeks of season extension turns a near-miss harvest into a sure one.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredLac qui Parle County sits in USDA hardiness zone 4b.
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 Lac qui Parle County is in
Lac qui Parle County spans 2 EPA Level III ecoregions — Western Corn Belt Plains (69%) and Northern Glaciated Plains (31%). Which one your land falls in changes what grows wild there and how the ground behaves, and a county-wide answer cannot tell you which.
What Grows in Lac qui Parle County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Lac qui Parle County's own USDA zone 4b and its own 175-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 Minnesota profile.
Is it too late to plant in Lac qui Parle 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 Mar 23; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 20 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 12 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. The tail of the season still works: sixty-day crops into late summer, quick greens after, garlic last of all.
Documented around Lac qui Parle County
- monarch butterfly29 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Lac qui Parle County
USGS estimates 280,328 lb of Glyphosate on Lac qui Parle County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Acetochlor (99,745 lb) and Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (71,202 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 Lac qui Parle County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Lac qui Parle County — 156 documented sites across 6 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 5 Toxics Release Inventory facilities. Active industrial facilities reporting chemical releases to air, water, and land.
The federal record across Lac qui Parle County is a modest one — a typical footprint for a growing area. Nothing here calls for alarm; it's worth knowing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and each one on the map carries its type and location. If one turns out to be a near neighbor, a one-time soil test settles the question.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Lac qui Parle County
Closest first, across Lac qui Parle County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- MADISON WWTPBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- MINNESOTA AG POWER INC- MADISONBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- TOFTE AUTO & SALESBrownfields · 0.7 mi
- Skelly Eastside Service StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- MADISON WELDING & REPAIRBrownfields · 1.0 mi
- LAC QUI PARLE COUNTY HIGHWAYBrownfields · 1.0 mi
- Gas N GrubUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- RICHARD LARSON DBA LARSON AUTO BODYBrownfields · 1.0 mi
- Cargill Inc - MadisonUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- THRIFTY WHITE DRUG 755Brownfields · 1.1 mi
- WESTERN GUARDBrownfields · 1.1 mi
- MADISON TACCBrownfields · 1.1 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Lac qui Parle 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 Lac qui Parle County.
Total Sites
156
across Lac qui Parle County
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
5 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
across Lac qui Parle County
Severity Distribution
across Lac qui Parle County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Lac qui Parle County, two things run higher than the national average across Lac qui Parle County — CAFO (14 sites) and Nitrate (58 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
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 Lac qui Parle 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 Lac qui Parle County average
Your land is one point inside Lac qui Parle County
Everything above resolves to Lac qui Parle County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 490K 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 Lac qui Parle County Average
Lac qui Parle County Average
- ●USDA Zones 4b, averaged across Lac qui Parle County
- ●One soil character for all of Lac qui Parle County
- ●Frost dates read at Lac qui Parle County's scale: Apr 20 to Oct 12
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Lac qui Parle County's 4b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Lac qui Parle County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Lac qui Parle County, Minnesota — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Lac qui Parle County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Lac qui Parle County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Lac qui Parle County average
How we know this about Lac qui Parle 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 Lac qui Parle County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Lac qui Parle County
When does frost risk typically end in Lac qui Parle County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Lac qui Parle County typically lands around Apr 20, 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 11.
How long is the growing season in Lac qui Parle County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Lac qui Parle County sees about 175 frost-free days — roughly Apr 20 through Oct 12, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 11 to Sep 28, about 140 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Lac qui Parle County?
The federal record around Lac qui Parle County shows 156 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (58), the nearest Brownfields record about 0.6 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.
Everything above is measured at Lac qui Parle County's scale — its 4b band and its 175-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Lac qui Parle 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 Minnesota's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Lac qui Parle County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Lac qui Parle County's own scale — its own ~175-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 156 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Lac qui Parle County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 4bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Lac qui Parle County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~175-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Lac qui Parle CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 156 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Brownfields record about 0.6 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Lac qui Parle County's boundary and the 489,613 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 4b and a ~175-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The 2 ecoregions Lac qui Parle County spans, Western Corn Belt Plains the largestUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Lac qui Parle County for a tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Lac qui Parle County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Minnesota grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Minnesota
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Lac qui Parle County — the ~175 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 Lac qui Parle County's 489,613 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 156 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 Lac qui Parle Countyread your own land →