Cooper County, in Missouri, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
Expect cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens to be strong candidates here; the deciding factors on any one parcel stay local — soil, sun, and drainage.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Cooper County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Cooper County, so your frost dates and drainage aren't the county average. 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 Cooper County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Cooper County — the short answer
Cooper County, Missouri: USDA zone 6b, about 225 days between hard freezes, across 361K acres.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 27
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 7
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~225
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 361K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are county 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 6b is Cooper County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Cooper County's 225-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Cooper County
Across a year, Cooper County accumulates about 3,795 growing degree days above 50°F, about 42 more than the middle Missouri county — ahead of 65 of Missouri’s 115 counties. Degree days are the heat a crop actually gets to work with — more of them is more room to ripen a long-season crop before the freeze closes the window.
Grounded in PRISM Climate Group, Oregon State University — 1991–2020 monthly normals
Soil in Cooper County
Across Cooper County, the ground is predominantly Alfisols, where Clafork, Menfro, and Goss are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a silt loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 6.0–6.5, slightly acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C soils.
Soil order
Alfisols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
9%
Hydric soils
9%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Cooper County
The USDA soil survey maps 36% of Cooper County as well drained — but another 64% drains differently: 32% moderately well drained, 26% somewhat poorly drained.
Clafork is the most extensive named soil at 11% of mapped acres, then Menfro (10%) and Goss (9%).
Which of them your own lot sits on is a parcel question, not a county one. Check your address for the survey at your boundary.
What this means for growing in Cooper County
Each reading below is measured for Cooper County itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Drainage
MeasuredThe dominant soils across Cooper County are well drained, in hydrologic group C — ground that drains quickly.
The upside is soil you can work early in spring and roots that never drown; the cost is that fast-draining ground dries out fast and leaches nutrients away before plants can use them.
Work in compost and mulch to hold moisture and feed, and water more often in short doses than deep and rarely.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Cooper County runs about pH 6.0–6.5, close to neutral.
This is the range most vegetables prefer — one correction you probably do not have to make, which is genuinely good news for a new bed.
Keep it there with compost rather than lime or sulfur, and only amend if your own soil test says otherwise.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredCooper County runs about 225 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
MeasuredCooper County sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b.
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 Cooper County is in
Cooper County spans 2 EPA Level III ecoregions — Interior River Valleys and Hills (66%) and Ozark Highlands (34%). Which one your land falls in changes what grows wild there and how the ground behaves, and a county-wide answer cannot tell you which.
What Grows in Cooper County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Cooper County's own USDA zone 6b and its own 225-day season between hard freezes, using the same matching engine that runs a full parcel report. These cleared both. Sun, soil pH and drainage vary lot by lot — those are the parcel questions below. Each card opens that plant's Missouri profile.
Is it too late to plant in Cooper County?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. 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 7 — 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 Cooper County
Survey cells within 31 miles of Cooper County checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 315 miles off. What to watch for.
- Japanese beetle5 documented records
- monarch butterfly4 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Cooper County
USGS estimates 80,927 lb of Glyphosate on Cooper County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Atrazine (40,077 lb) and Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (34,313 lb).
Farmland across the whole county, not any one lot. Check your address for the site-by-site record.
Safe to Grow Here?
What the federal record shows across Cooper County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Cooper County — 161 documented sites across 8 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 2 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed). Sites tracked in EPA's Superfund program — from assessment-stage CERCLIS entries to confirmed National Priorities List cleanup sites.
Cooper County carries one of the heavier federal records we track — and that's not a verdict on your yard. Proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis: nothing here says any particular parcel is affected. It does earn one concrete step — before food beds go in the ground, a professional soil test tells you exactly what you're working with, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well almost anywhere in the meantime.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Cooper County
Closest first, across Cooper County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- WHITEMAN AFB CHARLIE-4Underground Storage Tanks · 3.0 mi
- FARMERS ELEVATORUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.1 mi
- MISSOURI BETTER BEANSuperfund · 4.1 mi
- BUNCETON SERVICE CENTER INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.1 mi
- COOPER CO MAINTENANCE SHEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.1 mi
- LESLIE'S SERVICE CENTERUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.1 mi
- NIEBRUEGGE BEEFCAFO · 4.1 mi
- COOPER COUNTY R-IV SCHOOLUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.1 mi
- TOELLNER OIL COUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.2 mi
- BUNCETON MAINT BLDGUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.2 mi
- LONE ELM STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.2 mi
- T46N R17W 04BBB1Nitrate · 4.2 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Cooper County'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 Cooper County.
Severity Distribution
across Cooper County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Cooper County, two things run higher than the national average across Cooper County — CAFO (7 sites) and Mining (11 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.
Mining: Mining sites — both historic and active — can leach heavy metals (arsenic, lead, cadmium, mercury) into soil and water for centuries after operations cease.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Test soil for heavy metals (lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury) — this is essential near any mining site.
Check your specific parcel in Cooper County
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 Cooper County average
Your land is one point inside Cooper County
Everything above resolves to Cooper County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 361K 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 county 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 county average.
Your Lot vs the Cooper County Average
Cooper County Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Cooper County
- ●One soil character for all of Cooper County
- ●Frost dates read at Cooper County's scale: Mar 27 to Nov 7
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Cooper County's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Cooper County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Cooper County, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Cooper County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Cooper County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Cooper County average
How we know this about Cooper County
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at county grain; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at this county’s own record where one resolves, and the labelled statewide window where none does; soils from the USDA NRCS SSURGO survey, area-weighted across the county’s own map units; boundaries and acreage from US Census TIGER/Line 2025; the contamination and pesticide records from the federal sources named in their beats above. Where Cooper County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Cooper County
When does frost risk typically end in Cooper County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Cooper County 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.
How long is the growing season in Cooper County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Cooper County sees about 225 frost-free days — roughly Mar 27 through Nov 7, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 17 to Oct 24, about 190 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Cooper County?
The federal record around Cooper County runs heavier than most — 161 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (81), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 3.0 miles 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.
Everything above is measured at Cooper County's scale — its 6b band and its 225-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Cooper County's numbers: we read soil, sun, drainage and frost at your exact address. Try it for 14 days — no card required.
Will It Grow Here?
Zone fit is the first question — each answer below reads Missouri's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Cooper County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Cooper County's own scale — its own ~225-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 161 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Cooper County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Cooper County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~225-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Cooper CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 161 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 3.0 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Cooper County's boundary and the 361,437 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~225-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The 2 ecoregions Cooper County spans, Interior River Valleys and Hills the largestUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Cooper County for 2 tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Cooper County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Missouri grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Missouri
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Cooper County — the ~225 days above is one reading at its centre; the 12 towns below each carry their owntowns in this county →
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Cooper County's 361,437 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 161 documented sites actually reaches your soil — that needs your address, the wind, and the groundwater directionhow we read the record →
- Where cold air settles, which slopes face the sun, and which way the wind runs on your own ground — none of it survives being averaged over Cooper Countyread your own land →