Grand Pass, Missouri, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
These conditions suit cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — a starting list any specific site will trim or extend with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Grand Pass, 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 Grand Pass 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 Grand Pass — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Grand Pass — the short answer
Grand Pass, Missouri: USDA zone 6a, about 218 days between hard freezes, across 70 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 30
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 3
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~218
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 70 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 6a is Grand Pass's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Grand Pass's 218-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Grand Pass
Each reading below is measured for Grand Pass itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredGrand Pass runs about 218 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
MeasuredGrand Pass sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a.
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 Grand Pass is in
Grand Pass sits in the Western Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Grand Pass's own centroid rather than borrowed from Saline County.
What Grows in Grand Pass
Every plant below cleared Grand Pass's own zone 6a and its 218-day season. Each card opens that plant's Missouri profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Grand Pass?
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 2; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 30 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 3 — 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 Grand Pass
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Grand Pass. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- UNITED HOG SYSTEMS - WAVERLY SEW NURSERYCAFO · 1.4 mi
- UNITED HOG SYSTEMS Z-2 SOW/Z-DEV-1CAFO · 2.6 mi
- T51N R23W 04ABC1Nitrate · 2.7 mi
- T51N R24W 24BCB1Nitrate · 3.1 mi
- UNITED HOG SYSTEMS Z6-Z9CAFO · 3.1 mi
- MID-MISSOURI ENERGY LLCBrownfields · 3.3 mi
- MID-MISSOURI ENERGY LLCToxics Release Inventory · 3.3 mi
- T51N R24W 23ABD1Nitrate · 3.5 mi
- T51N R24W 14CDC1Nitrate · 3.7 mi
- CASEYS GENERAL STORE #1099Underground Storage Tanks · 3.7 mi
- T51N R24W 14CDB1Nitrate · 3.8 mi
- T51N R24W 14CCD1Nitrate · 3.8 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Grand Pass'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 Grand Pass.
Total Sites
70
within ~10 miles of Grand Pass
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
1 Toxics Release Inventory facility
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Grand Pass
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Grand Pass
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Grand Pass, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Grand Pass — CAFO (4 sites) and Nitrate (46 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.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Grand Pass
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 Grand Pass average
Your land is one point inside Grand Pass
Everything above resolves to Grand Pass as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 70 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 Grand Pass Average
Grand Pass Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Grand Pass
- ●One soil character for all of Grand Pass
- ●Frost dates read at Grand Pass's scale: Mar 30 to Nov 3
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Grand Pass's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Grand Pass
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Grand Pass, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Grand Pass averages can't show:
We read public map data around Grand Pass — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Grand Pass average
How we know this about Grand Pass
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 Grand Pass’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 Grand Pass
When does frost risk typically end in Grand Pass?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Grand Pass typically lands around Mar 30, 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 20.
When is the first frost in Grand Pass?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Grand Pass typically arrives around Nov 3, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 20, so the watching starts about Oct 4 — about 218 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Grand Pass?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Grand Pass sees about 218 frost-free days — roughly Mar 30 through Nov 3, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 20 to Oct 20, about 183 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Grand Pass?
The federal record around Grand Pass shows 70 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (46), the nearest CAFO 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.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Grand Pass?
From about Oct 4 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 3 (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 3. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Grand Pass's scale — its 6a band and its 218-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Grand Pass'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 Grand Pass’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Grand Pass's own scale — its own ~218-day season between 28°F freezes, the 70 acres it covers and 70 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Grand Pass's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Grand Pass's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 30 and Nov 3 and the ~218-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 70 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Grand Pass, the closest CAFO record about 1.4 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Grand Pass's boundary and the 70 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~218-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Grand Pass's own centroid, the Western Corn Belt PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Grand Pass's 70 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Saline County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Saline 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 Saline County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Grand Pass's 70 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Grand Pass you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 70 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest CAFO 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 Grand Pass-wide figureread your own land →
More in Missouri
Wider growing context
What grows across MissouriGrand Pass sits outside our named growing regions, so Missouri as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides