Eminence, Missouri, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
A short list that earns its place here — cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Even in Eminence, 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 Eminence 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 Eminence — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Eminence — the short answer
Eminence, Missouri: USDA zone 6b, about 202 days between hard freezes, across 1K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 5
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 24
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~202
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 1K 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 6b is Eminence's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Eminence's 202-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Eminence
Each reading below is measured for Eminence itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredEminence runs about 202 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
MeasuredEminence 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 Eminence is in
Eminence sits in the Ozark Highlands — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Eminence's own centroid rather than borrowed from Shannon County.
What Grows in Eminence
Every plant below cleared Eminence's own zone 6b and its 202-day season. Each card opens that plant's Missouri profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Eminence?
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 8; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 5 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 24 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Here the season winds down slowly: late sowings, a real autumn harvest, and garlic in the ground before the first hard freeze.
Documented around Eminence
Survey cells within 31 miles of Eminence checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 267 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Eminence
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Eminence. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- EMINENCE OIL COUnderground Storage Tanks · 450 ft
- ROWDENS EXPRESS LLCUnderground Storage Tanks · 750 ft
- EMINENCE COUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- WILLIAMS FAST STOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- DIX'S SERVICE STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- TOM'S PACKAGE STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 2500 ft
- SHAWNEE SHOP MAINTENANCE AREAUnderground Storage Tanks · 2600 ft
- T29N R04W 23CDA1Nitrate · 0.6 mi
- EMINENCE MAINT. LOTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- Slater MineMining · 1.4 mi
- Casey MineMining · 1.8 mi
- McKinney MineMining · 2.8 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Eminence'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 Eminence.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Eminence
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Eminence
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Eminence, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Eminence — Mining (15 sites) and Nitrate (32 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about 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.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Test soil for heavy metals (lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury) — this is essential near any mining site.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Eminence
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 Eminence average
Your land is one point inside Eminence
Everything above resolves to Eminence as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 1K 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 Eminence Average
Eminence Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Eminence
- ●One soil character for all of Eminence
- ●Frost dates read at Eminence's scale: Apr 5 to Oct 24
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Eminence's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Eminence
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Eminence, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Eminence averages can't show:
We read public map data around Eminence — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Eminence average
How we know this about Eminence
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 Eminence’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 Eminence
When does frost risk typically end in Eminence?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Eminence typically lands around Apr 5, 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 26.
When is the first frost in Eminence?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Eminence typically arrives around Oct 24, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 10, so the watching starts about Sep 24 — about 202 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Eminence?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Eminence sees about 202 frost-free days — roughly Apr 5 through Oct 24, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 26 to Oct 10, about 167 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Eminence?
The federal record around Eminence shows 63 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (32), 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 Eminence?
From about Sep 24 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 Oct 24 (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 Oct 24. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Eminence's scale — its 6b band and its 202-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Eminence'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 Eminence’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Eminence's own scale — its own ~202-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,206 acres it covers and 63 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Eminence's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Eminence's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 5 and Oct 24 and the ~202-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 63 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Eminence, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Eminence's boundary and the 1,206 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~202-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Eminence's own centroid, the Ozark HighlandsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Eminence checked, none carrying a detectionlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Eminence's 1,206 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Shannon County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Shannon 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 Shannon County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Eminence's 1,206 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Eminence you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,206 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 Eminence-wide figureread your own land →
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