Carterville, Missouri, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
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 Carterville, 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 Carterville 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 Carterville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Carterville — the short answer
Carterville, Missouri: USDA zone 7a, about 231 days between hard freezes, across 2K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 25
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 11
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~231
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 2K 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 Carterville's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Carterville's 231-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Carterville
Each reading below is measured for Carterville itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredCarterville runs about 231 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
MeasuredCarterville 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 Carterville is in
Carterville sits in the Ozark Highlands — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Carterville's own centroid rather than borrowed from Jasper County.
What Grows in Carterville
Every plant below cleared Carterville's own zone 7a and its 231-day season. Each card opens that plant's Missouri profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Carterville?
Too late for some crops, right on time for others — a growing season is a sequence, not a deadline. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 25; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 25 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 11 — 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 Carterville
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Carterville. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Burlington MineMining · 250 ft
- Osage MineMining · 500 ft
- Luscombe MineMining · 700 ft
- Concord MineMining · 750 ft
- Fullerton MineMining · 800 ft
- Lulu D. MineMining · 1000 ft
- SOUTHARDS SELF SERV LLCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- Garnet MineMining · 1400 ft
- Great Wonder MineMining · 1400 ft
- Brown and Root Ore Block XxivMining · 1500 ft
- STERN WILLIAMSToxics Release Inventory · 1500 ft
- Charter Oak MineMining · 1600 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Carterville'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 Carterville.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Carterville
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Carterville
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Carterville, Mining runs higher than the national average — 1,984 sites within ~10 miles of Carterville. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Mining: Mining sites — both historic and active — can leach heavy metals (arsenic, lead, cadmium, mercury) into soil and water for centuries after operations cease.
Test soil for heavy metals (lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury) — this is essential near any mining site.
Check your specific parcel in Carterville
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 Carterville average
Your land is one point inside Carterville
Everything above resolves to Carterville as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 2K 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 Carterville Average
Carterville Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Carterville
- ●One soil character for all of Carterville
- ●Frost dates read at Carterville's scale: Mar 25 to Nov 11
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Carterville's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Carterville
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Carterville, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Carterville averages can't show:
We read public map data around Carterville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Carterville average
How we know this about Carterville
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 Carterville’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 Carterville
When does frost risk typically end in Carterville?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Carterville typically lands around Mar 25, 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 15.
When is the first frost in Carterville?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Carterville typically arrives around Nov 11, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 28, so the watching starts about Oct 12 — about 231 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Carterville?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Carterville sees about 231 frost-free days — roughly Mar 25 through Nov 11, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 15 to Oct 28, about 196 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Carterville?
The federal record around Carterville runs heavier than most — 2,665 documented sites, mostly Mining entries (1,984), the nearest Mining 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 Carterville?
From about Oct 12 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 11 (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 11. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Carterville's scale — its 7a band and its 231-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Carterville'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 Carterville’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Carterville's own scale — its own ~231-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,668 acres it covers and 2,665 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Carterville's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Carterville's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 25 and Nov 11 and the ~231-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 2,665 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Carterville, the closest Mining record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Carterville's boundary and the 1,668 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~231-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Carterville's own centroid, the Ozark HighlandsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Carterville's 1,668 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Jasper County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Jasper 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 Jasper County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Carterville's 1,668 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Carterville you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,668 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Mining 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 Carterville-wide figureread your own land →
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