Montgomery County, in Missouri, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
The conditions favor cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens, among others — though every individual site edits that list with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Montgomery County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Montgomery 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 Montgomery County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Montgomery County — the short answer
Montgomery County, Missouri: USDA zone 6b, about 223 days between hard freezes, across 342K acres.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 29
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 7
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~223
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 342K 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 Montgomery County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Montgomery County's 223-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Montgomery County
Across a year, Montgomery County accumulates about 3,657 growing degree days above 50°F, about 96 fewer than the middle Missouri county — ahead of 41 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 Montgomery County
Across Montgomery County, the ground is predominantly Alfisols, where Mexico, Keswick, and Armster are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally poorly drained with a silt loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 5.9–6.7, slightly acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group D soils.
Soil order
Alfisols
Drainage
Poorly drained
Prime farmland
14%
Hydric soils
37%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Montgomery County
The USDA soil survey maps 35% of Montgomery County as poorly drained — but another 65% drains differently: 20% moderately well drained, 19% somewhat poorly drained.
Mexico is the most extensive named soil at 28% of mapped acres, then Keswick (12%) and Armster (10%).
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 Montgomery County
Each reading below is measured for Montgomery 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 Montgomery County are poorly drained, in hydrologic group D — ground that sheds water slowly.
Beds can stay saturated for days after heavy rain, and the roots of most vegetables, berries, and fruit trees suffocate or rot in soil that never drains.
Raised beds or mounded rows lift roots above the wet zone; choose water-tolerant crops for the lowest spots.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Montgomery County runs about pH 5.9–6.7, 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
MeasuredMontgomery County runs about 223 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
MeasuredMontgomery 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 Montgomery County is in
Montgomery County spans 2 EPA Level III ecoregions — Interior River Valleys and Hills (54%) and Central Irregular Plains (46%). 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 Montgomery County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Montgomery County's own USDA zone 6b and its own 223-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 Montgomery County?
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 Mar 1; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 29 (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. A long window like this one runs successions deep into fall — and even its last weeks take quick greens and garlic.
Documented around Montgomery County
Survey cells within 31 miles of Montgomery County checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 262 miles off. What to watch for.
- Japanese beetle3 documented records
- monarch butterfly2 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Montgomery County
USGS estimates 147,261 lb of Glyphosate on Montgomery County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Atrazine (68,031 lb) and Acetochlor (43,824 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 Montgomery County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Montgomery County — 96 documented sites across 5 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 8 Toxics Release Inventory facilities. Active industrial facilities reporting chemical releases to air, water, and land.
The federal record across Montgomery County is a modest one — a typical footprint for a growing area. Nothing here calls for alarm; it's worth knowing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and each one on the map carries its type and location. If one turns out to be a near neighbor, a one-time soil test settles the question.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Montgomery County
Closest first, across Montgomery County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- MONTGOMERY CO R-II HIGH SCHOOLUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.4 mi
- KRT INVESTMENTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.9 mi
- New FlorenceNitrate · 2.1 mi
- WARREN COUNTY CONCRETE - NEW FLORENCEToxics Release Inventory · 2.2 mi
- NEW FLORENCE MAINT BLDGUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.3 mi
- ABELS QUIK SHOP #17Underground Storage Tanks · 2.3 mi
- BIOFUELS USAUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.4 mi
- TYSON FRESH MEATS FWH, MONTGOMERY CITY MOBrownfields · 2.4 mi
- PORTA KING BUILDING SYSTEMSBrownfields · 2.4 mi
- JUNCTION FUEL & GROCERY LLCUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.5 mi
- O'FALLON GAS COUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.6 mi
- CARGILL NUTRENA FEEDSUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Montgomery 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 Montgomery County.
Total Sites
96
across Montgomery County
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
8 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
across Montgomery County
Severity Distribution
across Montgomery County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Montgomery County, two things run higher than the national average across Montgomery County — CAFO (3 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (8 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
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 Montgomery 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 Montgomery County average
Your land is one point inside Montgomery County
Everything above resolves to Montgomery County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 342K 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 Montgomery County Average
Montgomery County Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Montgomery County
- ●One soil character for all of Montgomery County
- ●Frost dates read at Montgomery County's scale: Mar 29 to Nov 7
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Montgomery County's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Montgomery County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Montgomery County, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Montgomery County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Montgomery County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Montgomery County average
How we know this about Montgomery 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 Montgomery County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Montgomery County
When does frost risk typically end in Montgomery County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Montgomery County typically lands around Mar 29, 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 19.
How long is the growing season in Montgomery County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Montgomery County sees about 223 frost-free days — roughly Mar 29 through Nov 7, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 19 to Oct 24, about 188 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Montgomery County?
The federal record around Montgomery County shows 96 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (43), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.4 miles out — a typical footprint for a growing area, and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. It's worth seeing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and testing the soil before new food beds near any of them.
Everything above is measured at Montgomery County's scale — its 6b band and its 223-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Montgomery 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 Montgomery County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Montgomery County's own scale — its own ~223-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 96 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Montgomery County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Montgomery County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~223-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Montgomery CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 96 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.4 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Montgomery County's boundary and the 342,430 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~223-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The 2 ecoregions Montgomery County spans, Interior River Valleys and Hills the largestUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Montgomery County for 2 tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Montgomery 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 Montgomery County — the ~223 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 Montgomery County's 342,430 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 96 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 Montgomery Countyread your own land →