Risco, Missouri, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
Reliable performers under these conditions include cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens; what your own ground favors still comes down to its soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Risco, 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 Risco 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 Risco — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Risco — the short answer
Risco, Missouri: USDA zone 7b, about 255 days between hard freezes, across 358 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 11
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 21
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~255
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 358 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 Risco's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Risco's 255-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Risco
Each reading below is measured for Risco itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredRisco runs about 255 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
MeasuredRisco 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 Risco is in
Risco sits in the Mississippi Alluvial Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Risco's own centroid rather than borrowed from New Madrid County.
What Grows in Risco
Every plant below cleared Risco's own zone 7b and its 255-day season. Each card opens that plant's Missouri profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Risco?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 11; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 11 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 21 — 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.
Documented around Risco
Survey cells within 31 miles of Risco checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 176 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Risco
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Risco. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- T22N R11E 13BAB1Nitrate · 1100 ft
- RISCO SCHOOL DISTRICTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- RISCO HIGH SCHOOLBrownfields · 1400 ft
- RISCO MAINT SHEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- T22N R11E 22CDC1Nitrate · 3.0 mi
- T23N R11E 25AAB1Nitrate · 4.1 mi
- T23N R11E 25ABB2Nitrate · 4.2 mi
- T23N R11E 25ABB1Nitrate · 4.2 mi
- DANIELS & SONUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.2 mi
- T22N R12E 34ACC1Nitrate · 5.5 mi
- T23N R11E 13ADCNitrate · 5.7 mi
- T23N R11E 20DCC1Nitrate · 5.8 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Risco'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 Risco.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Risco
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Risco
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Risco, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 40 sites within ~10 miles of Risco. Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
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 Risco
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 Risco average
Your land is one point inside Risco
Everything above resolves to Risco as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 358 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 Risco Average
Risco Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Risco
- ●One soil character for all of Risco
- ●Frost dates read at Risco's scale: Mar 11 to Nov 21
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Risco's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Risco
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Risco, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Risco averages can't show:
We read public map data around Risco — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Risco average
How we know this about Risco
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 Risco’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 Risco
When does frost risk typically end in Risco?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Risco typically lands around Mar 11, 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 1.
When is the first frost in Risco?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Risco typically arrives around Nov 21, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 7, so the watching starts about Oct 22 — about 255 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Risco?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Risco sees about 255 frost-free days — roughly Mar 11 through Nov 21, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 1 to Nov 7, about 220 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Risco?
The federal record around Risco is a meaningful one — 80 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (40), the nearest Nitrate record about 0.2 miles out — so a soil test before new food beds is a sensible precaution here, not a reason to hold back from growing. Remember that proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what sits where.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Risco?
From about Oct 22 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 21 (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 21. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Risco's scale — its 7b band and its 255-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Risco'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 Risco’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Risco's own scale — its own ~255-day season between 28°F freezes, the 358 acres it covers and 80 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Risco's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Risco's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 11 and Nov 21 and the ~255-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 80 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Risco, the closest Nitrate record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Risco's boundary and the 358 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~255-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Risco's own centroid, the Mississippi Alluvial PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Risco 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 Risco's 358 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 Risco's 358 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Risco you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 358 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 Risco-wide figureread your own land →