Lake Lafayette, Missouri, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
Reliable performers under these conditions include cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens; what your own ground favors still comes down to its soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Lake Lafayette, 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 Lake Lafayette 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 Lake Lafayette — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Lake Lafayette — the short answer
Lake Lafayette, Missouri: USDA zone 6b, about 220 days between hard freezes, across 412 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 29
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 4
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~220
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 412 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 Lake Lafayette's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Lake Lafayette's 220-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Lake Lafayette
Each reading below is measured for Lake Lafayette itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredLake Lafayette runs about 220 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
MeasuredLake Lafayette 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 Lake Lafayette is in
Lake Lafayette sits in the Central Irregular Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Lake Lafayette's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Lafayette County is mostly Western Corn Belt Plains. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Lake Lafayette
Every plant below cleared Lake Lafayette's own zone 6b and its 220-day season. Each card opens that plant's Missouri profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Lake Lafayette?
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 4 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. With a season this long, “too late” mostly means “switch crops” — second sowings and a full fall garden are the norm, with garlic closing the year.
What's on the federal record near Lake Lafayette
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Lake Lafayette. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- WHITEMAN AFB NOVEMBER-10Underground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- ODESSA PWSPFAS · 2.6 mi
- ADVANCED INDUSTRIES LLCBrownfields · 3.4 mi
- CASEYS GENERAL STORE #2909Underground Storage Tanks · 3.4 mi
- ADVANCED INDUSTRIES LLC DRYDENBrownfields · 3.4 mi
- KITCO INCToxics Release Inventory · 3.4 mi
- CASEYS GENERAL STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.4 mi
- ODESSA MOTORS INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.5 mi
- ODESSA AUTOMOTIVE REPAIR INCBrownfields · 3.5 mi
- PIGGLY WIGGLYUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.5 mi
- LIBRARYUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.6 mi
- CVS PHARMACY #11313Brownfields · 3.6 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Lake Lafayette'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 Lake Lafayette.
Total Sites
85
within ~10 miles of Lake Lafayette
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
2 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Lake Lafayette
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Lake Lafayette
Highest-Severity Sites
Know Before You Grow
- •Underground tanks leak petroleum as they age — near a former filling station, test the soil.
- •Near a brownfield, raised beds of imported soil give your food clean ground.
- •On a private well, test for nitrates: above 10 mg/L the water needs treatment before irrigating.
Check your specific parcel in Lake Lafayette
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 Lake Lafayette average
Your land is one point inside Lake Lafayette
Everything above resolves to Lake Lafayette as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 412 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 Lake Lafayette Average
Lake Lafayette Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Lake Lafayette
- ●One soil character for all of Lake Lafayette
- ●Frost dates read at Lake Lafayette's scale: Mar 29 to Nov 4
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Lake Lafayette's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Lake Lafayette
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Lake Lafayette, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Lake Lafayette averages can't show:
We read public map data around Lake Lafayette — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Lake Lafayette average
How we know this about Lake Lafayette
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 Lake Lafayette’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 Lake Lafayette
When does frost risk typically end in Lake Lafayette?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Lake Lafayette 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.
When is the first frost in Lake Lafayette?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Lake Lafayette typically arrives around Nov 4, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 21, so the watching starts about Oct 5 — about 220 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Lake Lafayette?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Lake Lafayette sees about 220 frost-free days — roughly Mar 29 through Nov 4, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 19 to Oct 21, about 185 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Lake Lafayette?
The federal record around Lake Lafayette shows 85 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (52), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.2 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 Lake Lafayette?
From about Oct 5 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 4 (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 4. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Lake Lafayette's scale — its 6b band and its 220-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Lake Lafayette'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 Lake Lafayette’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Lake Lafayette's own scale — its own ~220-day season between 28°F freezes, the 412 acres it covers and 85 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Lake Lafayette's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Lake Lafayette's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 29 and Nov 4 and the ~220-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 85 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Lake Lafayette, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Lake Lafayette's boundary and the 412 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~220-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Lake Lafayette sits in the Central Irregular Plains — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Lake Lafayette's 412 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Lafayette County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Lafayette 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 Lafayette County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Lake Lafayette's 412 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Lake Lafayette you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 412 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.2 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 Lake Lafayette-wide figureread your own land →
More in Missouri
Wider growing context
What grows across MissouriLake Lafayette sits outside our named growing regions, so Missouri as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides