St. Louis Park, Minnesota, 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.
On paper, cabbage, cranberry, lavender, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Even in St. Louis Park, 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 St. Louis Park 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 St. Louis Park — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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St. Louis Park — the short answer
St. Louis Park, Minnesota: USDA zone 5a, about 198 days between hard freezes, across 7K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 5a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 11
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 26
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~198
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 7K 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 5a is St. Louis Park's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against St. Louis Park's 198-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in St. Louis Park
Each reading below is measured for St. Louis Park itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredSt. Louis Park runs about 198 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
MeasuredSt. Louis Park sits in USDA hardiness zone 5a.
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 St. Louis Park is in
St. Louis Park sits in the North Central Hardwood Forests — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at St. Louis Park's own centroid rather than borrowed from Hennepin County.
What Grows in St. Louis Park
Every plant below cleared St. Louis Park's own zone 5a and its 198-day season. Each card opens that plant's Minnesota profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in St. Louis Park?
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 14; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 11 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 26 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Late in the year the fall bench takes over — quick greens, radishes, and garlic that repays you next summer.
What's on the federal record near St. Louis Park
Closest first, within ~10 miles of St. Louis Park. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- 117N21W17AAB 01 0000216030Nitrate · 200 ft
- 117N21W08DCD SLP CITY WELL 11Nitrate · 900 ft
- Joe's SA LLCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
- St Louis Park Service CenterUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- MIDWEST DENTALBrownfields · 1300 ft
- OAK KNOLL ANIMAL HOSPITALBrownfields · 1300 ft
- WILLIS & SCOTT PAINTER PROSBrownfields · 1300 ft
- SAINT LOUIS PARK SERVICE CENTBrownfields · 1400 ft
- BLVD CHIROPRACTIC CLINIC PABrownfields · 1700 ft
- ST LOUIS PARK SENIOR HIGH SCHOOLBrownfields · 1900 ft
- HENNEPIN COUNTY HHWBrownfields · 2100 ft
- COMMON GROUND ELECTRIC LLCBrownfields · 2100 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from St. Louis Park'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 St. Louis Park.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of St. Louis Park
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of St. Louis Park
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around St. Louis Park, Brownfields runs higher than the national average — 7,458 sites within ~10 miles of St. Louis Park. Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Brownfields: Brownfield sites are former commercial or industrial properties where legacy soil contamination (heavy metals, PAHs, petroleum compounds) may persist.
Check EPA brownfield remediation status — many sites have completed cleanup with institutional controls.
Check your specific parcel in St. Louis Park
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 St. Louis Park average
Your land is one point inside St. Louis Park
Everything above resolves to St. Louis Park as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 7K 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 St. Louis Park Average
St. Louis Park Average
- ●USDA Zones 5a, averaged across St. Louis Park
- ●One soil character for all of St. Louis Park
- ●Frost dates read at St. Louis Park's scale: Apr 11 to Oct 26
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not St. Louis Park's 5a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in St. Louis Park
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in St. Louis Park, Minnesota — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that St. Louis Park averages can't show:
We read public map data around St. Louis Park — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the St. Louis Park average
How we know this about St. Louis Park
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 St. Louis Park’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 St. Louis Park
When does frost risk typically end in St. Louis Park?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in St. Louis Park typically lands around Apr 11, 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 2.
When is the first frost in St. Louis Park?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in St. Louis Park typically arrives around Oct 26, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 12, so the watching starts about Sep 26 — about 198 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in St. Louis Park?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, St. Louis Park sees about 198 frost-free days — roughly Apr 11 through Oct 26, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 2 to Oct 12, about 163 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in St. Louis Park?
The federal record around St. Louis Park runs heavier than most — 10,229 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (7,458), the nearest Nitrate record under a tenth of a mile out — so test the soil before planting food in the ground, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well in the meantime. Even here, proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what's recorded and where.
How do I protect my plants from frost in St. Louis Park?
From about Sep 26 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 Oct 26 (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 Oct 26. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at St. Louis Park's scale — its 5a band and its 198-day season. Your yard writes its own version of St. Louis Park'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 St. Louis Park’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at St. Louis Park's own scale — its own ~198-day season between 28°F freezes, the 6,799 acres it covers and 10,229 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- St. Louis Park's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5aUSDA PHZM 2023
- St. Louis Park's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 11 and Oct 26 and the ~198-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 10,229 documented contamination sites on the federal record near St. Louis Park, the closest Nitrate record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- St. Louis Park's boundary and the 6,799 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5a and a ~198-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at St. Louis Park's own centroid, the North Central Hardwood ForestsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so St. Louis Park's 6,799 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Hennepin County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Hennepin County
- The growing challenges every Minnesota grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Minnesota
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Hennepin County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among St. Louis Park's 6,799 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of St. Louis Park you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 6,799 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate record under a tenth of a mile 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 St. Louis Park-wide figureread your own land →
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