Fort Calhoun, Nebraska, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Growers here do well with cabbage, blueberry, lavender, and collard greens — with the usual caveat that any single yard's soil, sun, and drainage cast the deciding vote.
Even in Fort Calhoun, 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 Fort Calhoun 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 Fort Calhoun — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Fort Calhoun — the short answer
Fort Calhoun, Nebraska: USDA zone 5b, about 205 days between hard freezes, across 444 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 5b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 6
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 28
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~205
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 444 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 5b is Fort Calhoun's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Fort Calhoun's 205-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Fort Calhoun
Each reading below is measured for Fort Calhoun itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredFort Calhoun runs about 205 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
MeasuredFort Calhoun sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b.
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 Fort Calhoun is in
Fort Calhoun sits in the Western Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Fort Calhoun's own centroid rather than borrowed from Washington County.
What Grows in Fort Calhoun
Every plant below cleared Fort Calhoun's own zone 5b and its 205-day season. Each card opens that plant's Nebraska profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Fort Calhoun?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 9; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 6 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 28 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. A long window like this one runs successions deep into fall — and even its last weeks take quick greens and garlic.
What's on the federal record near Fort Calhoun
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Fort Calhoun. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- TAYLOR QUIK PIKUnderground Storage Tanks · 200 ft
- CALHOUN OIL COMPANYUnderground Storage Tanks · 500 ft
- WILKINSON MANUFACTURING COBrownfields · 1400 ft
- 17N 12E11 1Nitrate · 2000 ft
- 17N 12E 11BC (M-238)Nitrate · 0.7 mi
- 17N 13E07AC (M-211)Nitrate · 1.9 mi
- 17N 12E 15CD (U-142)Nitrate · 1.9 mi
- 17N 12E 4DD (M-243)Nitrate · 2.1 mi
- WILSON ISLANDUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.4 mi
- DESOTO BEND MINI MARTUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.4 mi
- 17N 12E04ABA 01 (M-509)Nitrate · 2.6 mi
- 17N 12E 4BB (M-233)Nitrate · 2.9 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Fort Calhoun'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 Fort Calhoun.
Total Sites
236
within ~10 miles of Fort Calhoun
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
2 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Fort Calhoun
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Fort Calhoun
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Fort Calhoun, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Fort Calhoun — Nitrate (86 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (16 sites). 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.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Fort Calhoun
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 Fort Calhoun average
Your land is one point inside Fort Calhoun
Everything above resolves to Fort Calhoun as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 444 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 Fort Calhoun Average
Fort Calhoun Average
- ●USDA Zones 5b, averaged across Fort Calhoun
- ●One soil character for all of Fort Calhoun
- ●Frost dates read at Fort Calhoun's scale: Apr 6 to Oct 28
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Fort Calhoun's 5b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Fort Calhoun
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Fort Calhoun, Nebraska — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Fort Calhoun averages can't show:
We read public map data around Fort Calhoun — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Fort Calhoun average
How we know this about Fort Calhoun
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 Fort Calhoun’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 Fort Calhoun
When does frost risk typically end in Fort Calhoun?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Fort Calhoun typically lands around Apr 6, 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 27.
When is the first frost in Fort Calhoun?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Fort Calhoun typically arrives around Oct 28, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 14, so the watching starts about Sep 28 — about 205 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Fort Calhoun?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Fort Calhoun sees about 205 frost-free days — roughly Apr 6 through Oct 28, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 27 to Oct 14, about 170 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Fort Calhoun?
The federal record around Fort Calhoun is a meaningful one — 236 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (86), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks 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 Fort Calhoun?
From about Sep 28 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 Oct 28 (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 Oct 28. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Fort Calhoun's scale — its 5b band and its 205-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Fort Calhoun'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 Fort Calhoun’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Fort Calhoun's own scale — its own ~205-day season between 28°F freezes, the 444 acres it covers and 236 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Fort Calhoun's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Fort Calhoun's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 6 and Oct 28 and the ~205-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 236 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Fort Calhoun, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Fort Calhoun's boundary and the 444 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5b and a ~205-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Fort Calhoun's own centroid, the Western Corn Belt PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Fort Calhoun's 444 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Washington County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Washington County
- The growing challenges every Nebraska grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Nebraska
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Washington County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Fort Calhoun's 444 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Fort Calhoun you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 444 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 Fort Calhoun-wide figureread your own land →
More in Nebraska
Wider growing context
What grows across NebraskaFort Calhoun sits outside our named growing regions, so Nebraska as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides