Malta Bend, Missouri, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
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 Malta Bend, 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 Malta Bend 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 Malta Bend — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Malta Bend — the short answer
Malta Bend, Missouri: USDA zone 6b, about 216 days between hard freezes, across 162 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- 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 1
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~216
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 162 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 Malta Bend's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Malta Bend's 216-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Malta Bend
Each reading below is measured for Malta Bend itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredMalta Bend runs about 216 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
MeasuredMalta Bend 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 Malta Bend is in
Malta Bend sits in the Western Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Malta Bend's own centroid rather than borrowed from Saline County.
What Grows in Malta Bend
Every plant below cleared Malta Bend's own zone 6b and its 216-day season. Each card opens that plant's Missouri profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Malta Bend?
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 1 — 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 Malta Bend
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Malta Bend. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- T51N R22W 19ADA1Nitrate · 0.6 mi
- MID-MISSOURI ENERGY LLCToxics Release Inventory · 1.0 mi
- MID-MISSOURI ENERGY LLCBrownfields · 1.0 mi
- STRVPAS1 MO03Nitrate · 2.5 mi
- T51N R22W 21AAD1Nitrate · 2.5 mi
- UNITED HOG SYSTEMS - Z-10 SOW FARMCAFO · 3.1 mi
- T51N R22W 16BBB1Nitrate · 3.4 mi
- UNITED HOG SYSTEMS Z6-Z9CAFO · 3.5 mi
- T52N R22W 33DDD1Nitrate · 4.2 mi
- T50N R23W 10DAB1Nitrate · 4.8 mi
- T51N R23W 04ABC1Nitrate · 5.0 mi
- WHITEMAN AFB ALPHA-2Underground Storage Tanks · 5.3 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Malta Bend'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 Malta Bend.
Total Sites
110
within ~10 miles of Malta Bend
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
7 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Malta Bend
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Malta Bend
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Malta Bend, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Malta Bend — CAFO (5 sites) and Nitrate (50 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 Malta Bend
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 Malta Bend average
Your land is one point inside Malta Bend
Everything above resolves to Malta Bend as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 162 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 Malta Bend Average
Malta Bend Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Malta Bend
- ●One soil character for all of Malta Bend
- ●Frost dates read at Malta Bend's scale: Mar 30 to Nov 1
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Malta Bend's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Malta Bend
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Malta Bend, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Malta Bend averages can't show:
We read public map data around Malta Bend — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Malta Bend average
How we know this about Malta Bend
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 Malta Bend’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 Malta Bend
When does frost risk typically end in Malta Bend?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Malta Bend 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 Malta Bend?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Malta Bend typically arrives around Nov 1, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 18, so the watching starts about Oct 2 — about 216 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Malta Bend?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Malta Bend sees about 216 frost-free days — roughly Mar 30 through Nov 1, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 20 to Oct 18, about 181 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Malta Bend?
The federal record around Malta Bend shows 110 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (50), the nearest Nitrate record about 0.6 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 Malta Bend?
From about Oct 2 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 1 (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 1. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Malta Bend's scale — its 6b band and its 216-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Malta Bend'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 Malta Bend’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Malta Bend's own scale — its own ~216-day season between 28°F freezes, the 162 acres it covers and 110 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Malta Bend's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Malta Bend's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 30 and Nov 1 and the ~216-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 110 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Malta Bend, the closest Nitrate record about 0.6 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Malta Bend's boundary and the 162 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~216-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Malta Bend'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 Malta Bend's 162 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 Malta Bend's 162 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Malta Bend you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 162 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate record about 0.6 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 Malta Bend-wide figureread your own land →
More in Missouri
Wider growing context
What grows across MissouriMalta Bend sits outside our named growing regions, so Missouri as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides