Lockwood, Missouri, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Expect cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens to be strong candidates here; the deciding factors on any one parcel stay local — soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Lockwood, 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 Lockwood 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 Lockwood — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Lockwood — the short answer
Lockwood, Missouri: USDA zone 7a, about 224 days between hard freezes, across 621 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- 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 8
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~224
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 621 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 7a is Lockwood's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Lockwood's 224-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Lockwood
Each reading below is measured for Lockwood itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredLockwood runs about 224 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
MeasuredLockwood sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a.
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 Lockwood is in
Lockwood sits in the Ozark Highlands — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Lockwood's own centroid rather than borrowed from Dade County.
What Grows in Lockwood
Every plant below cleared Lockwood's own zone 7a and its 224-day season. Each card opens that plant's Missouri profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Lockwood?
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 8 — 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.
What's on the federal record near Lockwood
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Lockwood. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- T31N R28W 36AAC1Nitrate · 700 ft
- MFA PLANT FOODSUnderground Storage Tanks · 850 ft
- CITY OF LOCKWOOD, MOUnderground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
- COOSE TRAILERS MFG INCBrownfields · 1300 ft
- CASEYS GENERAL STORE #1235Underground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- PUMP N PANTRY OF LOCKWOOD LLCUnderground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
- T31N R27W 31BBBNitrate · 2200 ft
- T31N R27W 31CCC1Nitrate · 0.9 mi
- MODA-19Nitrate · 2.6 mi
- PETER XIONGCAFO · 3.4 mi
- MODA-1Nitrate · 4.2 mi
- EXPLOSIVES TECHNOLOGIES INTERNAT'LUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.6 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Lockwood'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 Lockwood.
Total Sites
58
within ~10 miles of Lockwood
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
1 Toxics Release Inventory facility
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Lockwood
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Lockwood
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Lockwood, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 26 sites within ~10 miles of Lockwood. 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.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Lockwood
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 Lockwood average
Your land is one point inside Lockwood
Everything above resolves to Lockwood as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 621 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 Lockwood Average
Lockwood Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Lockwood
- ●One soil character for all of Lockwood
- ●Frost dates read at Lockwood's scale: Mar 29 to Nov 8
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Lockwood's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Lockwood
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Lockwood, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Lockwood averages can't show:
We read public map data around Lockwood — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Lockwood average
How we know this about Lockwood
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 Lockwood’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 Lockwood
When does frost risk typically end in Lockwood?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Lockwood 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 Lockwood?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Lockwood typically arrives around Nov 8, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 25, so the watching starts about Oct 9 — about 224 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Lockwood?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Lockwood sees about 224 frost-free days — roughly Mar 29 through Nov 8, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 19 to Oct 25, about 189 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Lockwood?
The federal record around Lockwood shows 58 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (26), the nearest Nitrate record about 0.1 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 Lockwood?
From about Oct 9 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 8 (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 8. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Lockwood's scale — its 7a band and its 224-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Lockwood'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 Lockwood’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Lockwood's own scale — its own ~224-day season between 28°F freezes, the 621 acres it covers and 58 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Lockwood's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Lockwood's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 29 and Nov 8 and the ~224-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 58 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Lockwood, the closest Nitrate record about 0.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Lockwood's boundary and the 621 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~224-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Lockwood's own centroid, the Ozark HighlandsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Lockwood's 621 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Dade County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Dade 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 Dade County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Lockwood's 621 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Lockwood you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 621 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate record about 0.1 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 Lockwood-wide figureread your own land →
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