Traverse County, in Minnesota, sits in USDA hardiness zone 4b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Well-matched crops include cabbage, cranberry, turkish rocket, and collard greens, and the gap between "grows in the area" and "grows in your yard" is closed by soil, sun, and drainage.
Traverse County lies within the Red River Valley — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Traverse County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Traverse 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 Traverse County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Traverse County — the short answer
Traverse County, Minnesota: USDA zone 4b, about 173 days between hard freezes, across 367K acres.
- USDA zone
- 4b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 21
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 11
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~173
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 367K 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 Traverse County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Traverse County's 173-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Traverse County
Across a year, Traverse County accumulates about 2,262 growing degree days above 50°F, about 3 fewer than the middle Minnesota county — ahead of 42 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 Traverse County
Across Traverse County, the ground is predominantly Mollisols, where Doran, Mustinka, and Antler are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally somewhat poorly drained with a clay loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 7.0–7.2, neutral. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C soils.
Soil order
Mollisols
Drainage
Somewhat poorly drained
Prime farmland
43%
Hydric soils
30%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Traverse County
The USDA soil survey maps 49% of Traverse County as somewhat poorly drained — but another 50% drains differently: 22% poorly drained, 20% moderately well drained.
Doran is the most extensive named soil at 19% of mapped acres, then Mustinka (11%) and Antler (10%).
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 Traverse County
Each reading below is measured for Traverse 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 Traverse County are somewhat poorly drained, in hydrologic group C — 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 Traverse County runs about pH 7.0–7.2, 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
MeasuredTraverse County runs about 173 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
MeasuredTraverse 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 Traverse County is in
Traverse County spans 2 EPA Level III ecoregions — Lake Agassiz Plain (66%) and Northern Glaciated Plains (35%). 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 Traverse County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Traverse County's own USDA zone 4b and its own 173-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 Traverse County?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 24; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 21 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 11 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. As the window narrows, the plantings just get faster — fall brassicas, then greens, then garlic to finish.
What gets applied to farmland in Traverse County
USGS estimates 267,959 lb of Glyphosate on Traverse County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Acetochlor (97,211 lb) and Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (70,430 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 Traverse County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Traverse County — 123 documented sites across 4 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 11 concentrated animal feeding operations. Large-scale animal operations that can contaminate soil and groundwater with nitrates and pathogens.
The federal record across Traverse 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 Traverse County
Closest first, across Traverse County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- UC086IN Wheaton 3 0000233097Nitrate · 2.2 mi
- 127N46W20AAA 01 Wheaton 1Nitrate · 2.2 mi
- MNDOT D4 WHEATONBrownfields · 2.3 mi
- TRI-COUNTY COOP OILBrownfields · 2.4 mi
- TRAVERSE CARE CENTERBrownfields · 2.4 mi
- Casey's General Store #3629Underground Storage Tanks · 2.4 mi
- TRAVERSE COUNTY RECYCLINGBrownfields · 2.5 mi
- Larsons Oil IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.6 mi
- Wheaton Oil CoUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.6 mi
- StoneybrookUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.6 mi
- WHEATON DRUG AND GIFTSBrownfields · 2.6 mi
- TRAVERSE COUNTY SHERIFF'S OFFICEBrownfields · 2.6 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Traverse 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 Traverse County.
Total Sites
123
across Traverse County
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
11 concentrated animal feeding operations
Sources Checked
across Traverse County
Severity Distribution
across Traverse County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Traverse County, two things run higher than the national average across Traverse County — CAFO (11 sites) and Nitrate (60 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 Traverse 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 Traverse County average
Your land is one point inside Traverse County
Everything above resolves to Traverse County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 367K 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 Traverse County Average
Traverse County Average
- ●USDA Zones 4b, averaged across Traverse County
- ●One soil character for all of Traverse County
- ●Frost dates read at Traverse County's scale: Apr 21 to Oct 11
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Traverse County's 4b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Traverse County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Traverse County, Minnesota — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Traverse County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Traverse County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Traverse County average
How we know this about Traverse 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 Traverse County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Traverse County
When does frost risk typically end in Traverse County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Traverse County typically lands around Apr 21, 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 12.
How long is the growing season in Traverse County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Traverse County sees about 173 frost-free days — roughly Apr 21 through Oct 11, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 12 to Sep 27, about 138 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Traverse County?
The federal record around Traverse County shows 123 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (60), the nearest Nitrate record about 2.2 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.
Everything above is measured at Traverse County's scale — its 4b band and its 173-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Traverse 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 Traverse County’s own scale
8 of the readings below were taken at Traverse County's own scale — its own ~173-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 123 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Traverse County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 4bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Traverse County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~173-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Traverse CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 123 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Nitrate record about 2.2 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Traverse County's boundary and the 367,278 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 4b and a ~173-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The 2 ecoregions Traverse County spans, Lake Agassiz Plain the largestUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Traverse 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 Traverse County — the ~173 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 Traverse County's 367,278 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 123 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 Traverse Countyread your own land →