Rives, Missouri, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
These conditions suit cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens — a starting list any specific site will trim or extend with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Rives, 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 Rives 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 Rives — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Rives — the short answer
Rives, Missouri: USDA zone 7b, about 263 days between hard freezes, across 234 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 6
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 24
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~263
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 234 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 Rives's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Rives's 263-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Rives
Each reading below is measured for Rives itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredRives runs about 263 days between hard freezes — close to year-round growing.
Frost is rarely the limit here; winter plantings are as real as summer ones, and the harder question is which crops shrug off the summer heat.
Grow cool-season crops through the mild winter, and choose heat-tolerant varieties for the summer beds.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredRives 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 Rives is in
Rives sits in the Mississippi Alluvial Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Rives's own centroid rather than borrowed from Dunklin County.
What Grows in Rives
Every plant below cleared Rives's own zone 7b and its 263-day season. Each card opens that plant's Missouri profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Rives?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 6; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 6 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 24 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Here the calendar nearly circles: cool-season crops take the winter shift, and the next window is always close.
What's on the federal record near Rives
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Rives. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- BLEN RAGINSUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- T16N R09E 14ABANitrate · 4.8 mi
- T16N R09E 08ACDNitrate · 6.3 mi
- FORD OIL COUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.4 mi
- HORNERSVILLE AUTO & TRACTOR SUPPLYUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.5 mi
- GILBERT ROSS CHEVRONUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.6 mi
- T16N R09E 08ACD1Nitrate · 6.7 mi
- CABLES GROCERY & PACKAGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 7.0 mi
- T18N R09E 13CBC1Nitrate · 7.4 mi
- T16N R10E 24BCC1Nitrate · 7.6 mi
- CAROL'S GULFUnderground Storage Tanks · 7.8 mi
- GARDNER NORRIS & SON SERV STAUnderground Storage Tanks · 8.2 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Rives'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 Rives.
Total Sites
93
within ~10 miles of Rives
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
2 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Rives
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Rives
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Rives, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 38 sites within ~10 miles of Rives. 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 Rives
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 Rives average
Your land is one point inside Rives
Everything above resolves to Rives as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 234 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 Rives Average
Rives Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Rives
- ●One soil character for all of Rives
- ●Frost dates read at Rives's scale: Mar 6 to Nov 24
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Rives's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Rives
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Rives, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Rives averages can't show:
We read public map data around Rives — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Rives average
How we know this about Rives
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 Rives’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 Rives
When does frost risk typically end in Rives?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Rives typically lands around Mar 6, 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 Mar 27.
When is the first frost in Rives?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Rives typically arrives around Nov 24, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 10, so the watching starts about Oct 25 — about 263 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Rives?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Rives sees about 263 frost-free days — roughly Mar 6 through Nov 24, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 27 to Nov 10, about 228 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Rives?
The federal record around Rives shows 93 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (49), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.8 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 Rives?
From about Oct 25 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 24 (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 24. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Rives's scale — its 7b band and its 263-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Rives'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 Rives’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Rives's own scale — its own ~263-day season between 28°F freezes, the 234 acres it covers and 93 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Rives's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Rives's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 6 and Nov 24 and the ~263-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 93 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Rives, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.8 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Rives's boundary and the 234 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~263-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Rives's own centroid, the Mississippi Alluvial PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Rives's 234 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Dunklin County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Dunklin 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 Dunklin County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Rives's 234 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Rives you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 234 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.8 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 Rives-wide figureread your own land →