Benton City, Missouri, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
These conditions suit cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — a starting list any specific site will trim or extend with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Benton City, 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 Benton City 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 Benton City — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Benton City — the short answer
Benton City, Missouri: USDA zone 6b, about 220 days between hard freezes, across 67 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 30
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 5
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~220
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 67 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 6b is Benton City's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Benton City's 220-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Benton City
Each reading below is measured for Benton City itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredBenton City runs about 220 days between hard freezes — a long growing season.
There is slack for succession plantings and slow-finishing crops: many vegetables can be sown twice, and the heat-lovers have time to ripen fully.
Plan a second sowing of quick crops after the first comes out, and use the fall window most gardeners let sit idle.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredBenton City sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b.
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 Benton City is in
Benton City sits in the Central Irregular Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Benton City's own centroid rather than borrowed from Audrain County.
What Grows in Benton City
Every plant below cleared Benton City's own zone 6b and its 220-day season. Each card opens that plant's Missouri profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Benton City?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 2; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 30 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 5 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. A long window like this one runs successions deep into fall — and even its last weeks take quick greens and garlic.
Documented around Benton City
Survey cells within 31 miles of Benton City checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 262 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Benton City
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Benton City. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- T50N R08W 04DCA1Nitrate · 2.2 mi
- T50N R07W 05DBD1Nitrate · 2.9 mi
- T50N R07W 08DBD1Nitrate · 3.0 mi
- CENTRAL METALS RECYCLINGBrownfields · 3.0 mi
- T51N R07W 31AAB1Nitrate · 3.1 mi
- MORTON BUILDINGS, INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.2 mi
- TEVA PHARMACEUTICALS USA INCToxics Release Inventory · 3.4 mi
- TEVA PHARMACEUTICALS USA INCBrownfields · 3.4 mi
- T50N R07W 09BAA1Nitrate · 3.5 mi
- NEXANS MAGNET WIRE USA INCORPORATEDToxics Release Inventory · 3.7 mi
- HOME DEPOT DC #5938ABrownfields · 3.7 mi
- HOME DECORATORSBrownfields · 3.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Benton City'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 Benton City.
Total Sites
165
within ~10 miles of Benton City
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
14 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Benton City
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Benton City
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Benton City, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Benton City — CAFO (7 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (14 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Benton City
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 Benton City average
Your land is one point inside Benton City
Everything above resolves to Benton City as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 67 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 town 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 Benton City Average
Benton City Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Benton City
- ●One soil character for all of Benton City
- ●Frost dates read at Benton City's scale: Mar 30 to Nov 5
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Benton City's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Benton City
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Benton City, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Benton City averages can't show:
We read public map data around Benton City — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Benton City average
How we know this about Benton City
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this town’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at Benton City’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 town grain anywhere on this page — there is no town-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 Benton City
When does frost risk typically end in Benton City?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Benton City typically lands around Mar 30, 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 Apr 20.
When is the first frost in Benton City?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Benton City typically arrives around Nov 5, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 22, so the watching starts about Oct 6 — about 220 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Benton City?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Benton City sees about 220 frost-free days — roughly Mar 30 through Nov 5, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 20 to Oct 22, about 185 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Benton City?
The federal record around Benton City shows 165 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (74), 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.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Benton City?
From about Oct 6 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 Nov 5 (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 Nov 5. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Benton City's scale — its 6b band and its 220-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Benton City'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 Benton City’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Benton City's own scale — its own ~220-day season between 28°F freezes, the 67 acres it covers and 165 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Benton City's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Benton City's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 30 and Nov 5 and the ~220-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 165 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Benton City, the closest Nitrate record about 2.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Benton City's boundary and the 67 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~220-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Benton City's own centroid, the Central Irregular PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Benton City checked, none carrying a detectionlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Benton City's 67 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Audrain County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Audrain County
- The growing challenges every Missouri grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Missouri
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Audrain County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Benton City's 67 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Benton City you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 67 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate record about 2.2 miles 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 Benton City-wide figureread your own land →
More in Missouri
Wider growing context
What grows across MissouriBenton City sits outside our named growing regions, so Missouri as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides