Thurston County, in Nebraska, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
Among the crops suited to this profile: cabbage, cranberry, lavender, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Thurston County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Thurston 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 Thurston County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Thurston County — the short answer
Thurston County, Nebraska: USDA zone 5a, about 179 days between hard freezes, across 252K acres.
- USDA zone
- 5a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 20
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 16
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~179
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 252K 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 5a is Thurston County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Thurston County's 179-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Thurston County
Across a year, Thurston County accumulates about 2,859 growing degree days above 50°F, about 19 more than the middle Nebraska county — ahead of 48 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 Thurston County
Across Thurston County, the ground is predominantly Mollisols, where Moody, Nora, and Alcester are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a silt loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 6.5–7.5, neutral. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C soils.
Soil order
Mollisols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
31%
Hydric soils
8%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Thurston County
The USDA soil survey maps 84% of Thurston County as well drained — but another 15% drains differently: 7% poorly drained, 6% moderately well drained.
Moody is the most extensive named soil at 19% of mapped acres, then Nora (16%) and Alcester (13%).
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 Thurston County
Each reading below is measured for Thurston 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 Thurston 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 Thurston County runs about pH 6.5–7.5, 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
MeasuredThurston County runs about 179 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
MeasuredThurston County sits in USDA hardiness zone 5a.
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 Thurston County is in
Thurston County sits in the Western Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Thurston County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Thurston County's own USDA zone 5a and its own 179-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 Thurston County?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 23; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 20 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 16 — 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.
What gets applied to farmland in Thurston County
USGS estimates 216,481 lb of Glyphosate on Thurston County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Acetochlor (95,269 lb) and Atrazine (69,595 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 Thurston County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Thurston County — 61 documented sites across 5 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 4 Toxics Release Inventory facilities. Active industrial facilities reporting chemical releases to air, water, and land.
The federal record across Thurston 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 Thurston County
Closest first, across Thurston County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- STANEK BROS FARMUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.4 mi
- HERITAGE FOODTOWNUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.5 mi
- CIRCLE R TRAILERSToxics Release Inventory · 2.5 mi
- CIRCLE R TRAILERSBrownfields · 2.5 mi
- 25N 8E14ADBA3 (D-W3)Nitrate · 2.6 mi
- 25N 8E14ADBA2 (D-W2)Nitrate · 2.6 mi
- 25N 8E14ADBA1 (D-W1)Nitrate · 2.6 mi
- CIRCLE T FEEDLOTCAFO · 2.9 mi
- MORGAN FEEDLOT LLCCAFO · 3.7 mi
- 25N 9E17BAAA1 (U-002E)Nitrate · 5.0 mi
- 25N 9E17AABB1 (U-002F)Nitrate · 5.4 mi
- 26N 8E 11CC (D-Th1)Nitrate · 5.9 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Thurston 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 Thurston County.
Total Sites
61
across Thurston County
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
4 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
across Thurston County
Severity Distribution
across Thurston County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Thurston County, two things run higher than the national average across Thurston County — CAFO (9 sites) and Nitrate (24 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.
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 Thurston 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 Thurston County average
Your land is one point inside Thurston County
Everything above resolves to Thurston County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 252K 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 Thurston County Average
Thurston County Average
- ●USDA Zones 5a, averaged across Thurston County
- ●One soil character for all of Thurston County
- ●Frost dates read at Thurston County's scale: Apr 20 to Oct 16
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Thurston County's 5a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Thurston County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Thurston County, Nebraska — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Thurston County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Thurston County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Thurston County average
How we know this about Thurston 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 Thurston County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Thurston County
When does frost risk typically end in Thurston County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Thurston County typically lands around Apr 20, 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 May 11.
How long is the growing season in Thurston County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Thurston County sees about 179 frost-free days — roughly Apr 20 through Oct 16, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 11 to Oct 2, about 144 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Thurston County?
The federal record around Thurston County shows 61 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (24), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 2.4 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 Thurston County's scale — its 5a band and its 179-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Thurston 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 Thurston County’s own scale
8 of the readings below were taken at Thurston County's own scale — its own ~179-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 61 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Thurston County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Thurston County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~179-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Thurston CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 61 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 2.4 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Thurston County's boundary and the 251,899 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5a and a ~179-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Thurston County sitting wholly inside the Western Corn Belt PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Thurston 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 Thurston County — the ~179 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 Thurston County's 251,899 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 61 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 Thurston Countyread your own land →