Lock Springs, Missouri, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
On paper, cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Even in Lock Springs, 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 Lock Springs 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 Lock Springs — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Lock Springs — the short answer
Lock Springs, Missouri: USDA zone 6a, about 210 days between hard freezes, across 79 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 3
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 30
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~210
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 79 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 Lock Springs's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Lock Springs's 210-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Lock Springs
Each reading below is measured for Lock Springs itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredLock Springs runs about 210 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
MeasuredLock Springs 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 Lock Springs is in
Lock Springs sits in the Central Irregular Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Lock Springs's own centroid rather than borrowed from Daviess County.
What Grows in Lock Springs
Every plant below cleared Lock Springs's own zone 6a and its 210-day season. Each card opens that plant's Missouri profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Lock Springs?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 6; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 3 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 30 — 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 Lock Springs
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Lock Springs. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- T58N R26W 11DDA1Nitrate · 1000 ft
- T59N R25W 29DDA1Nitrate · 3.6 mi
- CHUCK WELDON FARMCAFO · 3.9 mi
- LANDMARK MANUFACTURING CORPToxics Release Inventory · 5.9 mi
- JOHNSON LAND AND DEVELOPMENT CO.CAFO · 6.3 mi
- BRECKENRIDGE R 1 SCHOOL DISTRICTBrownfields · 6.4 mi
- FARMERS STONE TRAGER QUARRIES COUnderground Storage Tanks · 7.3 mi
- LEEPER FARMSCAFO · 7.3 mi
- T59N R25W 05BBA1Nitrate · 7.8 mi
- UNITED HOG SYSTEMS -Z5 SOW FARMCAFO · 8.0 mi
- FRYS REPAIR SHOPBrownfields · 8.1 mi
- T58N R27W 09ACC1Nitrate · 8.4 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Lock Springs'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 Lock Springs.
Total Sites
27
within ~10 miles of Lock Springs
Risk Level
Low
Highest-severity
1 Toxics Release Inventory facility
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Lock Springs
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Lock Springs
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Lock Springs, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Lock Springs — CAFO (4 sites) and Nitrate (12 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
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 Lock Springs
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 Lock Springs average
Your land is one point inside Lock Springs
Everything above resolves to Lock Springs as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 79 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 Lock Springs Average
Lock Springs Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Lock Springs
- ●One soil character for all of Lock Springs
- ●Frost dates read at Lock Springs's scale: Apr 3 to Oct 30
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Lock Springs's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Lock Springs
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Lock Springs, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Lock Springs averages can't show:
We read public map data around Lock Springs — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Lock Springs average
How we know this about Lock Springs
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 Lock Springs’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 Lock Springs
When does frost risk typically end in Lock Springs?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Lock Springs typically lands around Apr 3, 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 24.
When is the first frost in Lock Springs?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Lock Springs typically arrives around Oct 30, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 16, so the watching starts about Sep 30 — about 210 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Lock Springs?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Lock Springs sees about 210 frost-free days — roughly Apr 3 through Oct 30, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 24 to Oct 16, about 175 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Lock Springs?
The federal record around Lock Springs is light — 27 documented sites across the 9 federal source types we checked, mostly Nitrate entries (12), the nearest Nitrate record about 0.2 miles out — and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. Growing food here starts from a strong position; a soil test before new food beds settles any site-specific question.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Lock Springs?
From about Sep 30 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 30 (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 30. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Lock Springs's scale — its 6a band and its 210-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Lock Springs'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 Lock Springs’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Lock Springs's own scale — its own ~210-day season between 28°F freezes, the 79 acres it covers and 27 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Lock Springs's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Lock Springs's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 3 and Oct 30 and the ~210-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 27 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Lock Springs, the closest Nitrate record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Lock Springs's boundary and the 79 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~210-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Lock Springs's own centroid, the Central Irregular PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Lock Springs's 79 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Daviess County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Daviess 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 Daviess County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Lock Springs's 79 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Lock Springs you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 79 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate record about 0.2 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 Lock Springs-wide figureread your own land →
More in Missouri
Wider growing context
What grows across MissouriLock Springs sits outside our named growing regions, so Missouri as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides