Breckenridge Hills, Missouri, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
On paper, cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Even in Breckenridge Hills, 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 Breckenridge Hills 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 Breckenridge Hills — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Breckenridge Hills — the short answer
Breckenridge Hills, Missouri: USDA zone 7a, about 247 days between hard freezes, across 513 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 18
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 20
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~247
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 513 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 7a is Breckenridge Hills's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Breckenridge Hills's 247-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Breckenridge Hills
Each reading below is measured for Breckenridge Hills itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredBreckenridge Hills runs about 247 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
MeasuredBreckenridge Hills sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a.
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 Breckenridge Hills is in
Breckenridge Hills sits in the Interior River Valleys and Hills — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Breckenridge Hills's own centroid rather than borrowed from St. Louis County.
What Grows in Breckenridge Hills
Every plant below cleared Breckenridge Hills's own zone 7a and its 247-day season. Each card opens that plant's Missouri profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Breckenridge Hills?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 18; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 18 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 20 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. There is slack in a calendar like this — late plantings, second rounds of favorites, and a fall bench that keeps beds working.
Documented around Breckenridge Hills
Survey cells within 31 miles of Breckenridge Hills checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 240 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Breckenridge Hills
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Breckenridge Hills. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- AIRWAY SUNOCOUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- REGENCY MOTORS INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- UNITED MART 3Underground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- FAMILY DOLLAR # 1720Brownfields · 1700 ft
- AMOCO OIL SS #5366Underground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- SCHNUCKS MARKETBrownfields · 1900 ft
- OVERLAND CENTRAL OFFICEUnderground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- OVERLANDUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- ALEX AUTO CAREBrownfields · 2300 ft
- JERRYS AUTO BODYBrownfields · 2500 ft
- MIKE'S AUTO REPAIRUnderground Storage Tanks · 2500 ft
- HAROLDS SUNOCOUnderground Storage Tanks · 2600 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Breckenridge Hills'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 Breckenridge Hills.
Total Sites
3,628
within ~10 miles of Breckenridge Hills
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
34 Superfund sites
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Breckenridge Hills
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Breckenridge Hills
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Breckenridge Hills, Toxics Release Inventory runs higher than the national average — 268 sites within ~10 miles of Breckenridge Hills. Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Breckenridge Hills
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 Breckenridge Hills average
Your land is one point inside Breckenridge Hills
Everything above resolves to Breckenridge Hills as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 513 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 Breckenridge Hills Average
Breckenridge Hills Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Breckenridge Hills
- ●One soil character for all of Breckenridge Hills
- ●Frost dates read at Breckenridge Hills's scale: Mar 18 to Nov 20
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Breckenridge Hills's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Breckenridge Hills
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Breckenridge Hills, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Breckenridge Hills averages can't show:
We read public map data around Breckenridge Hills — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Breckenridge Hills average
How we know this about Breckenridge Hills
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 Breckenridge Hills’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 Breckenridge Hills
When does frost risk typically end in Breckenridge Hills?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Breckenridge Hills typically lands around Mar 18, 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 8.
When is the first frost in Breckenridge Hills?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Breckenridge Hills typically arrives around Nov 20, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 6, so the watching starts about Oct 21 — about 247 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Breckenridge Hills?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Breckenridge Hills sees about 247 frost-free days — roughly Mar 18 through Nov 20, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 8 to Nov 6, about 212 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Breckenridge Hills?
The federal record around Breckenridge Hills is a meaningful one — 3,628 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (2,213), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 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.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Breckenridge Hills?
From about Oct 21 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 20 (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 20. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Breckenridge Hills's scale — its 7a band and its 247-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Breckenridge Hills'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 Breckenridge Hills’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Breckenridge Hills's own scale — its own ~247-day season between 28°F freezes, the 513 acres it covers and 3,628 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Breckenridge Hills's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Breckenridge Hills's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 18 and Nov 20 and the ~247-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 3,628 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Breckenridge Hills, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Breckenridge Hills's boundary and the 513 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~247-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Breckenridge Hills's own centroid, the Interior River Valleys and HillsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Breckenridge Hills 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 Breckenridge Hills's 513 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom St. Louis County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom St. Louis 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 St. Louis County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Breckenridge Hills's 513 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Breckenridge Hills you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 513 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 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 Breckenridge Hills-wide figureread your own land →
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