Commerce, 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.
The conditions favor cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens, among others — though every individual site edits that list with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Commerce, 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 Commerce 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 Commerce — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Commerce — the short answer
Commerce, Missouri: USDA zone 7a, about 245 days between hard freezes, across 221 acres of town.
- 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 18
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~245
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 221 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 Commerce's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Commerce's 245-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Commerce
Each reading below is measured for Commerce itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredCommerce runs about 245 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
MeasuredCommerce 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 Commerce is in
Commerce sits in the Interior River Valleys and Hills — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Commerce's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Scott County is mostly Mississippi Alluvial Plain. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Commerce
Every plant below cleared Commerce's own zone 7a and its 245-day season. Each card opens that plant's Missouri profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Commerce?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. 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 18 — 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.
What's on the federal record near Commerce
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Commerce. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- SEMO MILLINGBrownfields · 1.4 mi
- CAPE GIRARDEAU PWSPFAS · 2.9 mi
- SCOTT CITY PWSPFAS · 2.9 mi
- T29N R14E 34CAC1Nitrate · 3.5 mi
- 16S 2E- 7.7fNitrate · 4.1 mi
- T29N R14E 03BCC1Nitrate · 4.4 mi
- T29N R14E 03BBD1Nitrate · 4.8 mi
- Jones Service StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.9 mi
- ENTERPRISE PRODUCTS - CAPE GIRARDEAU TERMINALBrownfields · 5.0 mi
- BUDDY EIFERT SERVICE STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.1 mi
- Fill-Up MartUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.1 mi
- Ford Bruce & CliffordUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.2 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Commerce'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 Commerce.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Commerce
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Commerce
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Commerce, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Commerce — CAFO (3 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (12 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 Commerce
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 Commerce average
Your land is one point inside Commerce
Everything above resolves to Commerce as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 221 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 Commerce Average
Commerce Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Commerce
- ●One soil character for all of Commerce
- ●Frost dates read at Commerce's scale: Mar 18 to Nov 18
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Commerce's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Commerce
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Commerce, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Commerce averages can't show:
We read public map data around Commerce — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Commerce average
How we know this about Commerce
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 Commerce’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 Commerce
When does frost risk typically end in Commerce?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Commerce 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 Commerce?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Commerce typically arrives around Nov 18, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 4, so the watching starts about Oct 19 — about 245 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Commerce?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Commerce sees about 245 frost-free days — roughly Mar 18 through Nov 18, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 8 to Nov 4, about 210 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Commerce?
The federal record around Commerce is a meaningful one — 115 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (52), the nearest Brownfields record about 1.4 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 Commerce?
From about Oct 19 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 18 (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 18. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Commerce's scale — its 7a band and its 245-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Commerce'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 Commerce’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Commerce's own scale — its own ~245-day season between 28°F freezes, the 221 acres it covers and 115 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Commerce's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Commerce's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 18 and Nov 18 and the ~245-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 115 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Commerce, the closest Brownfields record about 1.4 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Commerce's boundary and the 221 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~245-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Commerce sits in the Interior River Valleys and Hills — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Commerce's 221 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Scott County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Scott 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 Scott County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Commerce's 221 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Commerce you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 221 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields record about 1.4 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 Commerce-wide figureread your own land →