Thayer County, in Nebraska, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
Growers here do well with cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — with the usual caveat that any single yard's soil, sun, and drainage cast the deciding vote.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Thayer County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Thayer County, so your frost dates and drainage aren't the county average. 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 Thayer County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Thayer County — the short answer
Thayer County, Nebraska: USDA zone 6a, about 197 days between hard freezes, across 367K acres.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 9
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 23
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~197
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 367K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are county 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 6a is Thayer County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Thayer County's 197-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Thayer County
Across a year, Thayer County accumulates about 3,353 growing degree days above 50°F, about 513 more than the middle Nebraska county — ahead of 88 of Nebraska’s 93 counties. Degree days are the heat a crop actually gets to work with — more of them is more room to ripen a long-season crop before the freeze closes the window.
Grounded in PRISM Climate Group, Oregon State University — 1991–2020 monthly normals
Soil in Thayer County
Across Thayer County, the ground is predominantly Mollisols, where Crete, Hastings, and Muir are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a silt loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 5.7–6.5, slightly acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C soils.
Soil order
Mollisols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
65%
Hydric soils
1%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Thayer County
The USDA soil survey maps 66% of Thayer County as well drained — but another 33% drains differently: 27% moderately well drained, 3% somewhat poorly drained.
Crete is the most extensive named soil at 27% of mapped acres, then Hastings (12%) and Muir (7%).
Which of them your own lot sits on is a parcel question, not a county one. Check your address for the survey at your boundary.
What this means for growing in Thayer County
Each reading below is measured for Thayer County itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Drainage
MeasuredThe dominant soils across Thayer County are well drained, in hydrologic group C — ground that drains quickly.
The upside is soil you can work early in spring and roots that never drown; the cost is that fast-draining ground dries out fast and leaches nutrients away before plants can use them.
Work in compost and mulch to hold moisture and feed, and water more often in short doses than deep and rarely.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Thayer County runs about pH 5.7–6.5, close to neutral.
This is the range most vegetables prefer — one correction you probably do not have to make, which is genuinely good news for a new bed.
Keep it there with compost rather than lime or sulfur, and only amend if your own soil test says otherwise.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredThayer County runs about 197 days between hard freezes — a moderate growing season.
There is room for the full run of cool-season crops plus a warm-season main crop, but the calendar is tight enough that a late spring or early fall frost still decides how much finishes.
Time warm-season transplants to your last hard freeze, and a few weeks of season extension turns a near-miss harvest into a sure one.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredThayer County sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a.
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 Thayer County is in
Thayer County sits in the Central Great Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Thayer County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Thayer County's own USDA zone 6a and its own 197-day season between hard freezes, using the same matching engine that runs a full parcel report. These cleared both. Sun, soil pH and drainage vary lot by lot — those are the parcel questions below. Each card opens that plant's Nebraska profile.
Is it too late to plant in Thayer County?
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 Mar 12; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 9 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 23 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Late in the year the fall bench takes over — quick greens, radishes, and garlic that repays you next summer.
Documented around Thayer County
- monarch butterfly603 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Thayer County
USGS estimates 329,447 lb of Glyphosate on Thayer County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Atrazine (175,309 lb) and Acetochlor (143,768 lb).
Farmland across the whole county, not any one lot. Check your address for the site-by-site record.
Safe to Grow Here?
What the federal record shows across Thayer County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Thayer County — 42 documented sites across 6 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 1 Toxics Release Inventory facility. Active industrial facilities reporting chemical releases to air, water, and land.
The federal record across Thayer County is a modest one — a typical footprint for a growing area. Nothing here calls for alarm; it's worth knowing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and each one on the map carries its type and location. If one turns out to be a near neighbor, a one-time soil test settles the question.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Thayer County
Closest first, across Thayer County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- BUCHLI AND SON IMPLEMENTBrownfields · 2600 ft
- DANSID LLCUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- HEBRON PUBLIC SCHOOLSBrownfields · 0.8 mi
- 81 EXPRESSUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- CASEYS GENERAL STORE #1576Underground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- SHELL FOOD MARTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- 3N 3W24DA 1Nitrate · 2.6 mi
- DAVENPORT SERVICE INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.7 mi
- 4N 3W36BC 1Nitrate · 6.8 mi
- STRUVE ENTERPRISESUnderground Storage Tanks · 7.1 mi
- ZUCKER INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 7.1 mi
- C & M SUPPLYUnderground Storage Tanks · 7.2 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Thayer County'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 Thayer County.
Total Sites
42
across Thayer County
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
1 Toxics Release Inventory facility
Sources Checked
across Thayer County
Severity Distribution
across Thayer County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Thayer County, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 14 sites across Thayer County. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
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 Thayer County
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 Thayer County average
Your land is one point inside Thayer County
Everything above resolves to Thayer County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 367K 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 county 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 county average.
Your Lot vs the Thayer County Average
Thayer County Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Thayer County
- ●One soil character for all of Thayer County
- ●Frost dates read at Thayer County's scale: Apr 9 to Oct 23
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Thayer County's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Thayer County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Thayer County, Nebraska — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Thayer County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Thayer County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Thayer County average
How we know this about Thayer County
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at county grain; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at this county’s own record where one resolves, and the labelled statewide window where none does; soils from the USDA NRCS SSURGO survey, area-weighted across the county’s own map units; boundaries and acreage from US Census TIGER/Line 2025; the contamination and pesticide records from the federal sources named in their beats above. Where Thayer County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Thayer County
When does frost risk typically end in Thayer County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Thayer County typically lands around Apr 9, 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 30.
How long is the growing season in Thayer County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Thayer County sees about 197 frost-free days — roughly Apr 9 through Oct 23, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 30 to Oct 9, about 162 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Thayer County?
The federal record around Thayer County shows 42 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (16), the nearest Brownfields record about 0.5 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.
Everything above is measured at Thayer County's scale — its 6a band and its 197-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Thayer County's numbers: we read soil, sun, drainage and frost at your exact address. Try it for 14 days — no card required.
Will It Grow Here?
Zone fit is the first question — each answer below reads Nebraska's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Thayer County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Thayer County's own scale — its own ~197-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 42 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Thayer County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Thayer County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~197-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Thayer CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 42 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Brownfields record about 0.5 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Thayer County's boundary and the 367,225 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~197-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Thayer County sitting wholly inside the Central Great PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Thayer County for a tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Thayer County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Nebraska grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Nebraska
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Thayer County — the ~197 days above is one reading at its centre; the 12 towns below each carry their owntowns in this county →
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Thayer County's 367,225 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 42 documented sites actually reaches your soil — that needs your address, the wind, and the groundwater directionhow we read the record →
- Where cold air settles, which slopes face the sun, and which way the wind runs on your own ground — none of it survives being averaged over Thayer Countyread your own land →