Sikeston, Missouri, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Crops well matched to these conditions include cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens — though what thrives on any one site still turns on its specific soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Sikeston, 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 Sikeston 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 Sikeston — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Sikeston — the short answer
Sikeston, Missouri: USDA zone 7b, about 249 days between hard freezes, across 11K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 15
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 19
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~249
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 11K 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 Sikeston's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Sikeston's 249-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Sikeston
Each reading below is measured for Sikeston itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredSikeston runs about 249 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
MeasuredSikeston 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 Sikeston is in
Sikeston sits in the Mississippi Alluvial Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Sikeston's own centroid rather than borrowed from Scott County.
What Grows in Sikeston
Every plant below cleared Sikeston's own zone 7b and its 249-day season. Each card opens that plant's Missouri profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Sikeston?
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 Feb 15; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 15 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 19 — 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 Sikeston
Survey cells within 31 miles of Sikeston checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 168 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Sikeston
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Sikeston. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- RHODES 101 STOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- T26N R14E 19DCB1Nitrate · 1800 ft
- T26N R14E 19CDC1Nitrate · 1900 ft
- FAST GASUnderground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- CENTRALIA MAINT LOTUnderground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- SIKESTON, MONitrate · 2000 ft
- T26N R14E 19CCD2Nitrate · 2100 ft
- SEMO MOTOR COMPANYUnderground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- BREAK TIME #3133Underground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- SIKESTONUnderground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
- SIKESTON CO (CF8750)Underground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
- WALGREENS #9301Brownfields · 2300 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Sikeston'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 Sikeston.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Sikeston
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Sikeston
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Sikeston, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Sikeston — CAFO (5 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (17 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Sikeston
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 Sikeston average
Your land is one point inside Sikeston
Everything above resolves to Sikeston as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 11K 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 Sikeston Average
Sikeston Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Sikeston
- ●One soil character for all of Sikeston
- ●Frost dates read at Sikeston's scale: Mar 15 to Nov 19
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Sikeston's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Sikeston
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Sikeston, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Sikeston averages can't show:
We read public map data around Sikeston — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Sikeston average
How we know this about Sikeston
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 Sikeston’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 Sikeston
When does frost risk typically end in Sikeston?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Sikeston typically lands around Mar 15, 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 5.
When is the first frost in Sikeston?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Sikeston typically arrives around Nov 19, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 5, so the watching starts about Oct 20 — about 249 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Sikeston?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Sikeston sees about 249 frost-free days — roughly Mar 15 through Nov 19, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 5 to Nov 5, about 214 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Sikeston?
The federal record around Sikeston is a meaningful one — 225 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (102), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 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 Sikeston?
From about Oct 20 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 19 (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 19. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Sikeston's scale — its 7b band and its 249-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Sikeston'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 Sikeston’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Sikeston's own scale — its own ~249-day season between 28°F freezes, the 11,459 acres it covers and 225 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Sikeston's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Sikeston's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 15 and Nov 19 and the ~249-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 225 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Sikeston, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Sikeston's boundary and the 11,459 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~249-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Sikeston's own centroid, the Mississippi Alluvial PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Sikeston 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 Sikeston's 11,459 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Scott County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Scott 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 Scott County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Sikeston's 11,459 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Sikeston you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 11,459 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 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 Sikeston-wide figureread your own land →