East Prairie, Missouri, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
Growers here do well with cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens — with the usual caveat that any single yard's soil, sun, and drainage cast the deciding vote.
Even in East Prairie, 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 East Prairie 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 East Prairie — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
East Prairie — the short answer
East Prairie, Missouri: USDA zone 7b, about 248 days between hard freezes, across 800 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 16
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 19
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~248
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 800 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 7b is East Prairie's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against East Prairie's 248-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in East Prairie
Each reading below is measured for East Prairie itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredEast Prairie runs about 248 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
MeasuredEast Prairie sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b.
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 East Prairie is in
East Prairie sits in the Mississippi Alluvial Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at East Prairie's own centroid rather than borrowed from Mississippi County.
What Grows in East Prairie
Every plant below cleared East Prairie's own zone 7b and its 248-day season. Each card opens that plant's Missouri profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in East Prairie?
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 16; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 16 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 19 — 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 East Prairie
Closest first, within ~10 miles of East Prairie. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- EAST PRAIRIE BUSINESSMAN'S ASSNUnderground Storage Tanks · 500 ft
- T25N R15E 25CAC2Nitrate · 850 ft
- FORMER"" KC'S JIFFY MARTUnderground Storage Tanks · 900 ft
- T25N R15E 25CAC01Nitrate · 950 ft
- T25N R15E 25CAC1Nitrate · 950 ft
- JIM BLUMENBERG STANDARD STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 950 ft
- CITY OF EAST PRAIRIEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- KCS JIFFY MART INC RONALD & SANDRAUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- MFA EXCHANGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
- EAST PRAIRIE R-2 BUS GARAGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- COFFER GARAGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- WALKERS AUTO REPAIRBrownfields · 2600 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from East Prairie'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 East Prairie.
Total Sites
70
within ~10 miles of East Prairie
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
2 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of East Prairie
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of East Prairie
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around East Prairie, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 28 sites within ~10 miles of East Prairie. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in East Prairie
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 East Prairie average
Your land is one point inside East Prairie
Everything above resolves to East Prairie as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 800 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 East Prairie Average
East Prairie Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across East Prairie
- ●One soil character for all of East Prairie
- ●Frost dates read at East Prairie's scale: Mar 16 to Nov 19
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not East Prairie's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in East Prairie
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in East Prairie, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that East Prairie averages can't show:
We read public map data around East Prairie — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the East Prairie average
How we know this about East Prairie
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 East Prairie’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 East Prairie
When does frost risk typically end in East Prairie?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in East Prairie typically lands around Mar 16, 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 6.
When is the first frost in East Prairie?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in East Prairie typically arrives around Nov 19, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 5, so the watching starts about Oct 20 — about 248 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in East Prairie?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, East Prairie sees about 248 frost-free days — roughly Mar 16 through Nov 19, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 6 to Nov 5, about 213 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in East Prairie?
The federal record around East Prairie shows 70 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (34), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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.
How do I protect my plants from frost in East Prairie?
From about Oct 20 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 19 (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 19. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at East Prairie's scale — its 7b band and its 248-day season. Your yard writes its own version of East Prairie'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 East Prairie’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at East Prairie's own scale — its own ~248-day season between 28°F freezes, the 800 acres it covers and 70 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- East Prairie's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- East Prairie's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 16 and Nov 19 and the ~248-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 70 documented contamination sites on the federal record near East Prairie, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- East Prairie's boundary and the 800 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~248-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at East Prairie's own centroid, the Mississippi Alluvial PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so East Prairie's 800 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Mississippi County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Mississippi 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 Mississippi County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among East Prairie's 800 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of East Prairie you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 800 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks 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 East Prairie-wide figureread your own land →