Bull Creek, Missouri, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
Growers here do well with cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens — with the usual caveat that any single yard's soil, sun, and drainage cast the deciding vote.
Even in Bull Creek, 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 Bull Creek 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 Bull Creek — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Bull Creek — the short answer
Bull Creek, Missouri: USDA zone 7a, about 224 days between hard freezes, across 107 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 27
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 6
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~224
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 107 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 Bull Creek's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Bull Creek's 224-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Bull Creek
Each reading below is measured for Bull Creek itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredBull Creek runs about 224 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
MeasuredBull Creek 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 Bull Creek is in
Bull Creek sits in the Ozark Highlands — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Bull Creek's own centroid rather than borrowed from Taney County.
What Grows in Bull Creek
Every plant below cleared Bull Creek's own zone 7a and its 224-day season. Each card opens that plant's Missouri profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Bull Creek?
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 27; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 27 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 6 — 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.
What's on the federal record near Bull Creek
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Bull Creek. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- BULL CREEK STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
- WALNUT SHADE IN & OUTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- PINEGAR CHEVY OLDSBrownfields · 1.1 mi
- PINEGAR BUICK PONTIAC GMC TRUCKSBrownfields · 1.2 mi
- TANEYCOMO ABANDONED DRUMSSuperfund · 1.2 mi
- CRAWFORDS 66 - CLOSEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- CASA DE LUZUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- WALNUT SHADE MAINTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.5 mi
- CALIBER COLLISION CENTER BRANSON 2420Brownfields · 1.7 mi
- SPRINGFIELD DISTRICTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.7 mi
- HILAND DAIRYUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.7 mi
- T23N R21W 12CCANitrate · 2.3 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Bull Creek'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 Bull Creek.
Total Sites
197
within ~10 miles of Bull Creek
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Bull Creek
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Bull Creek
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Bull Creek, PFAS runs higher than the national average — 7 sites within ~10 miles of Bull Creek. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check your specific parcel in Bull Creek
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 Bull Creek average
Your land is one point inside Bull Creek
Everything above resolves to Bull Creek as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 107 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 Bull Creek Average
Bull Creek Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Bull Creek
- ●One soil character for all of Bull Creek
- ●Frost dates read at Bull Creek's scale: Mar 27 to Nov 6
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Bull Creek's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Bull Creek
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Bull Creek, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Bull Creek averages can't show:
We read public map data around Bull Creek — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Bull Creek average
How we know this about Bull Creek
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 Bull Creek’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 Bull Creek
When does frost risk typically end in Bull Creek?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Bull Creek typically lands around Mar 27, 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 17.
When is the first frost in Bull Creek?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Bull Creek typically arrives around Nov 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 23, so the watching starts about Oct 7 — about 224 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Bull Creek?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Bull Creek sees about 224 frost-free days — roughly Mar 27 through Nov 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 17 to Oct 23, about 189 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Bull Creek?
The federal record around Bull Creek is a meaningful one — 197 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (113), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 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 Bull Creek?
From about Oct 7 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 6 (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 6. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Bull Creek's scale — its 7a band and its 224-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Bull Creek'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 Bull Creek’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Bull Creek's own scale — its own ~224-day season between 28°F freezes, the 107 acres it covers and 197 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Bull Creek's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Bull Creek's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 27 and Nov 6 and the ~224-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 197 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Bull Creek, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Bull Creek's boundary and the 107 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~224-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Bull Creek's own centroid, the Ozark HighlandsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Bull Creek's 107 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Taney County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Taney 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 Taney County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Bull Creek's 107 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Bull Creek you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 107 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 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 Bull Creek-wide figureread your own land →
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