Waseca County, in Minnesota, sits in USDA hardiness zone 4b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
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.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Waseca County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Waseca 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 Waseca County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Waseca County — the short answer
Waseca County, Minnesota: USDA zone 4b, about 180 days between hard freezes, across 271K 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 17
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~180
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 271K 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 Waseca County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Waseca County's 180-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Waseca County
Across a year, Waseca County accumulates about 2,403 growing degree days above 50°F, about 138 more than the middle Minnesota county — ahead of 70 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 Waseca County
Across Waseca County, the ground is predominantly Mollisols, where Webster, Le Sueur, and Glencoe are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally poorly drained with a clay loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 6.2–6.7, slightly acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C/D soils.
Soil order
Mollisols
Drainage
Poorly drained
Prime farmland
31%
Hydric soils
53%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Waseca County
The USDA soil survey maps 40% of Waseca County as poorly drained — but another 58% drains differently: 19% somewhat poorly drained, 15% well drained.
Webster is the most extensive named soil at 10% of mapped acres, then Le Sueur (9%) and Glencoe (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 Waseca County
Each reading below is measured for Waseca 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 Waseca 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 Waseca County runs about pH 6.2–6.7, 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
MeasuredWaseca County runs about 180 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
MeasuredWaseca 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 Waseca County is in
Waseca County spans 2 EPA Level III ecoregions — Western Corn Belt Plains (84%) and North Central Hardwood Forests (16%). 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 Waseca County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Waseca County's own USDA zone 4b and its own 180-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 Waseca County?
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 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 17 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Even past midsummer there is room for a true fall garden here, and garlic planted near the close carries the momentum into next year.
What gets applied to farmland in Waseca County
USGS estimates 162,239 lb of Glyphosate on Waseca County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Acetochlor (96,830 lb) and Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (63,852 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 Waseca County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Waseca County — 216 documented sites across 6 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 7 Toxics Release Inventory facilities. Active industrial facilities reporting chemical releases to air, water, and land.
There's a meaningful federal record across Waseca 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 Waseca County
Closest first, across Waseca County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- TDL FARMS LLP - GUSE SITECAFO · 1.6 mi
- KRAUSE PORK LLCCAFO · 1.7 mi
- 466328Nitrate · 2.4 mi
- KEITH KRAUSE FARM - SEC 14CAFO · 2.6 mi
- KRAUSE PORK LLC-HALEY SITECAFO · 2.6 mi
- A&A FARMSCAFO · 2.7 mi
- EPIC PORK - SITE 1CAFO · 3.0 mi
- 2005 Building Area Exp and Misc - CSWUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.3 mi
- COUNTRY IMPRESSIONS - WASECABrownfields · 4.3 mi
- WasecaPFAS · 4.6 mi
- WASECA COUNTY HHW PROGRAMBrownfields · 4.7 mi
- CONAGRA FOODS PACKAGED FOODS LLCBrownfields · 4.9 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Waseca 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 Waseca County.
Total Sites
216
across Waseca County
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
7 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
across Waseca County
Severity Distribution
across Waseca County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Waseca County, CAFO runs higher than the national average — 49 sites across Waseca County. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Check your specific parcel in Waseca 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 Waseca County average
Your land is one point inside Waseca County
Everything above resolves to Waseca County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 271K 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 Waseca County Average
Waseca County Average
- ●USDA Zones 4b, averaged across Waseca County
- ●One soil character for all of Waseca County
- ●Frost dates read at Waseca County's scale: Apr 20 to Oct 17
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Waseca County's 4b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Waseca County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Waseca County, Minnesota — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Waseca County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Waseca County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Waseca County average
How we know this about Waseca 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 Waseca County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Waseca County
When does frost risk typically end in Waseca County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Waseca 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 Waseca County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Waseca County sees about 180 frost-free days — roughly Apr 20 through Oct 17, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 11 to Oct 3, about 145 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Waseca County?
The federal record around Waseca County is a meaningful one — 216 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (74), the nearest CAFO record about 1.6 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.
Everything above is measured at Waseca County's scale — its 4b band and its 180-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Waseca 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 Waseca County’s own scale
8 of the readings below were taken at Waseca County's own scale — its own ~180-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 216 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Waseca County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 4bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Waseca County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~180-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Waseca CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 216 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest CAFO record about 1.6 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Waseca County's boundary and the 270,951 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 4b and a ~180-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The 2 ecoregions Waseca County spans, Western Corn Belt Plains the largestUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Waseca 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 Waseca County — the ~180 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 Waseca County's 270,951 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 216 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 Waseca Countyread your own land →