Stover, Missouri, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
These conditions suit cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — a starting list any specific site will trim or extend with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Stover, 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 Stover 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 Stover — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Stover — the short answer
Stover, Missouri: USDA zone 6b, about 223 days between hard freezes, across 568 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 28
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 6
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~223
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 568 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 Stover's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Stover's 223-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Stover
Each reading below is measured for Stover itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredStover runs about 223 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
MeasuredStover 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 Stover is in
Stover sits in the Ozark Highlands — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Stover's own centroid rather than borrowed from Morgan County.
What Grows in Stover
Every plant below cleared Stover's own zone 6b and its 223-day season. Each card opens that plant's Missouri profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Stover?
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 28; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 28 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 6 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. There is slack in a calendar like this — late plantings, second rounds of favorites, and a fall bench that keeps beds working.
Documented around Stover
Survey cells within 31 miles of Stover checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 342 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Stover
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Stover. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- TEMP STOP #105Underground Storage Tanks · 300 ft
- STOVER FINAUnderground Storage Tanks · 350 ft
- STOVER SINCLAIRUnderground Storage Tanks · 400 ft
- EHLERS OIL COUnderground Storage Tanks · 400 ft
- TOTAL SERVICE STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 450 ft
- CASEYS GENERAL STORE #1239Underground Storage Tanks · 600 ft
- T43N R19W 35CAA1Nitrate · 1000 ft
- S & S AUTO AND CYCLE LLCBrownfields · 1000 ft
- WITTE MFA STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- CROSMAN CORPBrownfields · 1100 ft
- STOVER MILLING OC INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
- STOVER MAINT BLDGUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Stover'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 Stover.
Total Sites
122
within ~10 miles of Stover
Risk Level
High
Highest-severity
4 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Stover
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Stover
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Stover, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Stover — CAFO (19 sites) and Mining (54 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Mining: Mining sites — both historic and active — can leach heavy metals (arsenic, lead, cadmium, mercury) into soil and water for centuries after operations cease.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Test soil for heavy metals (lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury) — this is essential near any mining site.
Check your specific parcel in Stover
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 Stover average
Your land is one point inside Stover
Everything above resolves to Stover as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 568 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 Stover Average
Stover Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Stover
- ●One soil character for all of Stover
- ●Frost dates read at Stover's scale: Mar 28 to Nov 6
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Stover's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Stover
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Stover, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Stover averages can't show:
We read public map data around Stover — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Stover average
How we know this about Stover
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 Stover’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 Stover
When does frost risk typically end in Stover?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Stover typically lands around Mar 28, 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 18.
When is the first frost in Stover?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Stover typically arrives around Nov 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 23, so the watching starts about Oct 7 — about 223 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Stover?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Stover sees about 223 frost-free days — roughly Mar 28 through Nov 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 18 to Oct 23, about 188 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Stover?
The federal record around Stover runs heavier than most — 122 documented sites, mostly Mining entries (54), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out — so test the soil before planting food in the ground, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well in the meantime. Even here, proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what's recorded and where.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Stover?
From about Oct 7 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 6 (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 6. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Stover's scale — its 6b band and its 223-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Stover'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 Stover’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Stover's own scale — its own ~223-day season between 28°F freezes, the 568 acres it covers and 122 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Stover's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Stover's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 28 and Nov 6 and the ~223-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 122 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Stover, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Stover's boundary and the 568 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~223-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Stover's own centroid, the Ozark HighlandsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Stover 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 Stover's 568 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Morgan County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Morgan 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 Morgan County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Stover's 568 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Stover you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 568 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 Stover-wide figureread your own land →
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