Vanduser, Missouri, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Reliable performers under these conditions include cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens; what your own ground favors still comes down to its soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Vanduser, 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 Vanduser 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 Vanduser — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Vanduser — the short answer
Vanduser, Missouri: USDA zone 7a, about 238 days between hard freezes, across 82 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 19
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 12
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~238
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 82 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 7a is Vanduser's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Vanduser's 238-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Vanduser
Each reading below is measured for Vanduser itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredVanduser runs about 238 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
MeasuredVanduser sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a.
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 Vanduser is in
Vanduser sits in the Mississippi Alluvial Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Vanduser's own centroid rather than borrowed from Scott County.
What Grows in Vanduser
Every plant below cleared Vanduser's own zone 7a and its 238-day season. Each card opens that plant's Missouri profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Vanduser?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 19; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 19 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 12 — 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.
Documented around Vanduser
Survey cells within 31 miles of Vanduser 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 Vanduser
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Vanduser. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- T27N R13E 08CCCNitrate · 300 ft
- T27N R13E 17BBA1Nitrate · 550 ft
- T27N R13E 09BCANitrate · 1.3 mi
- GARY KESLERCAFO · 2.6 mi
- G AND B POULTRY FARMSCAFO · 3.4 mi
- SMITH'S GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.2 mi
- T27N R12E 16ABB1Nitrate · 4.6 mi
- MORELY SHEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.0 mi
- WHEELER TRUCK TRAILER EQUIPMENT CO-WHEELER TRUCK TRAILER EQUIPMENT COToxics Release Inventory · 5.1 mi
- WHEELER TRUCK TRAILER EQUIPMENT CO-WHEELER TRUCK TRAILER EQUIPMENT COBrownfields · 5.1 mi
- T27N R12E 28BAA3Nitrate · 5.2 mi
- T26N R14E 19CDD2Nitrate · 5.3 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Vanduser'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 Vanduser.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Vanduser
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Vanduser
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Vanduser, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Vanduser — CAFO (8 sites) and Nitrate (60 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
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 Vanduser
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 Vanduser average
Your land is one point inside Vanduser
Everything above resolves to Vanduser as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 82 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 Vanduser Average
Vanduser Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Vanduser
- ●One soil character for all of Vanduser
- ●Frost dates read at Vanduser's scale: Mar 19 to Nov 12
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Vanduser's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Vanduser
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Vanduser, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Vanduser averages can't show:
We read public map data around Vanduser — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Vanduser average
How we know this about Vanduser
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 Vanduser’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 Vanduser
When does frost risk typically end in Vanduser?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Vanduser typically lands around Mar 19, 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 9.
When is the first frost in Vanduser?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Vanduser typically arrives around Nov 12, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 29, so the watching starts about Oct 13 — about 238 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Vanduser?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Vanduser sees about 238 frost-free days — roughly Mar 19 through Nov 12, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 9 to Oct 29, about 203 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Vanduser?
The federal record around Vanduser is a meaningful one — 169 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (65), the nearest Nitrate record under a tenth of a mile 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 Vanduser?
From about Oct 13 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 12 (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 12. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Vanduser's scale — its 7a band and its 238-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Vanduser'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 Vanduser’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Vanduser's own scale — its own ~238-day season between 28°F freezes, the 82 acres it covers and 169 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Vanduser's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Vanduser's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 19 and Nov 12 and the ~238-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 169 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Vanduser, the closest Nitrate record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Vanduser's boundary and the 82 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~238-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Vanduser's own centroid, the Mississippi Alluvial PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Vanduser 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 Vanduser's 82 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 Vanduser's 82 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Vanduser you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 82 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate 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 Vanduser-wide figureread your own land →