Cabool, Missouri, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Well-matched crops include cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens, and the gap between "grows in the area" and "grows in your yard" is closed by soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Cabool, 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 Cabool 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 Cabool — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Cabool — the short answer
Cabool, Missouri: USDA zone 7a, about 224 days between hard freezes, across 3K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 26
- 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
- ~224
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 3K 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 Cabool's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Cabool's 224-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Cabool
Each reading below is measured for Cabool itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredCabool 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
MeasuredCabool 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 Cabool is in
Cabool sits in the Ozark Highlands — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Cabool's own centroid rather than borrowed from Texas County.
What Grows in Cabool
Every plant below cleared Cabool'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 Cabool?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 26; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 26 (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. With a season this long, “too late” mostly means “switch crops” — second sowings and a full fall garden are the norm, with garlic closing the year.
Documented around Cabool
Survey cells within 31 miles of Cabool checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 307 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Cabool
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Cabool. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- CABOOL U-SAVE - SOLDUnderground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
- CASEYS GENERAL STORE #1236Underground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
- RON'S TIRE & FIX-IT-SHOP - SOLDUnderground Storage Tanks · 1400 ft
- T28N R11W 12BADNitrate · 1500 ft
- CITY OF CABOOLUnderground Storage Tanks · 1600 ft
- CABOOL COUnderground Storage Tanks · 1600 ft
- HOCKER OIL COUnderground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- T28N R11W 12BCD2Nitrate · 1700 ft
- POSITRONIC INDUSTRIES INCToxics Release Inventory · 1800 ft
- CABOOL MIDDLE SCHOOLUnderground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- BROWN SHOE COToxics Release Inventory · 2200 ft
- VACANTUnderground Storage Tanks · 2400 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Cabool'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 Cabool.
Total Sites
76
within ~10 miles of Cabool
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
9 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Cabool
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Cabool
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Cabool, Toxics Release Inventory runs higher than the national average — 9 sites within ~10 miles of Cabool. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
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 Cabool
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 Cabool average
Your land is one point inside Cabool
Everything above resolves to Cabool as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 3K 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 Cabool Average
Cabool Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Cabool
- ●One soil character for all of Cabool
- ●Frost dates read at Cabool's scale: Mar 26 to Nov 5
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Cabool's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Cabool
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Cabool, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Cabool averages can't show:
We read public map data around Cabool — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Cabool average
How we know this about Cabool
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 Cabool’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 Cabool
When does frost risk typically end in Cabool?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Cabool typically lands around Mar 26, 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 16.
When is the first frost in Cabool?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Cabool 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 224 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Cabool?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Cabool sees about 224 frost-free days — roughly Mar 26 through Nov 5, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 16 to Oct 22, about 189 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Cabool?
The federal record around Cabool is a meaningful one — 76 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (38), 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 Cabool?
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 Cabool's scale — its 7a band and its 224-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Cabool'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 Cabool’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Cabool's own scale — its own ~224-day season between 28°F freezes, the 2,541 acres it covers and 76 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Cabool's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Cabool's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 26 and Nov 5 and the ~224-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 76 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Cabool, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Cabool's boundary and the 2,541 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 Cabool's own centroid, the Ozark HighlandsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Cabool 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 Cabool's 2,541 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Texas County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Texas 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 Texas County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Cabool's 2,541 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Cabool you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 2,541 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 Cabool-wide figureread your own land →
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