Howardville, Missouri, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
On paper, cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Even in Howardville, 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 Howardville 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 Howardville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Howardville — the short answer
Howardville, Missouri: USDA zone 7b, about 252 days between hard freezes, across 146 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 13
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 20
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~252
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 146 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 Howardville's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Howardville's 252-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Howardville
Each reading below is measured for Howardville itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredHowardville runs about 252 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
MeasuredHowardville 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 Howardville is in
Howardville sits in the Mississippi Alluvial Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Howardville's own centroid rather than borrowed from New Madrid County.
What Grows in Howardville
Every plant below cleared Howardville's own zone 7b and its 252-day season. Each card opens that plant's Missouri profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Howardville?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 13; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 13 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 20 — 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 Howardville
Survey cells within 31 miles of Howardville checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 164 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Howardville
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Howardville. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- NEW MADRID COUNTY R1 SCHOOL DISTRICTBrownfields · 0.7 mi
- T23N R13E 35CAA1Nitrate · 1.5 mi
- MFA OIL COMPANYUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- TOWNLEYS STATION & CAR WASHUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.8 mi
- T23N R13E 35ACC1Nitrate · 1.9 mi
- T23N R13E 35CAANitrate · 2.0 mi
- T23N R13E 35ADA1Nitrate · 2.0 mi
- H. G. RHODESUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.0 mi
- GREAT RIVER SOY PROCESSING LLCToxics Release Inventory · 2.2 mi
- CASEYS GENERAL STORE #1884Underground Storage Tanks · 2.3 mi
- KOCH ASPHALTUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.3 mi
- BROWN SAND & GRAVEL DBA HEARTLAND ASPHALT MATERIALSToxics Release Inventory · 2.3 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Howardville'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 Howardville.
Total Sites
70
within ~10 miles of Howardville
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
7 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Howardville
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Howardville
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Howardville, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Howardville — Nitrate (34 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (7 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Howardville
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 Howardville average
Your land is one point inside Howardville
Everything above resolves to Howardville as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 146 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 Howardville Average
Howardville Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Howardville
- ●One soil character for all of Howardville
- ●Frost dates read at Howardville's scale: Mar 13 to Nov 20
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Howardville's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Howardville
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Howardville, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Howardville averages can't show:
We read public map data around Howardville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Howardville average
How we know this about Howardville
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 Howardville’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 Howardville
When does frost risk typically end in Howardville?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Howardville typically lands around Mar 13, 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 3.
When is the first frost in Howardville?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Howardville typically arrives around Nov 20, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 6, so the watching starts about Oct 21 — about 252 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Howardville?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Howardville sees about 252 frost-free days — roughly Mar 13 through Nov 20, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 3 to Nov 6, about 217 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Howardville?
The federal record around Howardville shows 70 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (34), the nearest Brownfields record about 0.7 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 Howardville?
From about Oct 21 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 20 (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 20. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Howardville's scale — its 7b band and its 252-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Howardville'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 Howardville’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Howardville's own scale — its own ~252-day season between 28°F freezes, the 146 acres it covers and 70 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Howardville's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Howardville's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 13 and Nov 20 and the ~252-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 70 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Howardville, the closest Brownfields record about 0.7 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Howardville's boundary and the 146 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~252-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Howardville's own centroid, the Mississippi Alluvial PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Howardville 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 Howardville's 146 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom New Madrid County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom New Madrid 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 New Madrid County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Howardville's 146 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Howardville you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 146 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields record about 0.7 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 Howardville-wide figureread your own land →