Preble County, in Ohio, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Crops well matched to these conditions include cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — though what thrives on any one site still turns on its specific soil, sun, and drainage.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Preble County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Preble 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 Preble County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Preble County — the short answer
Preble County, Ohio: USDA zone 6a, about 205 days between hard freezes, across 272K 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 31
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~205
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 272K 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 Preble County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Preble County's 205-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Preble County
Across a year, Preble County accumulates about 3,046 growing degree days above 50°F, about 124 more than the middle Ohio county — ahead of 62 of Ohio’s 88 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 Preble County
Across Preble County, the ground is predominantly Alfisols, where Celina, Miamian, and Kokomo are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a silt loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 6.2–6.5, slightly acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C/D soils.
Soil order
Alfisols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
42%
Hydric soils
20%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Preble County
The USDA soil survey maps 37% of Preble County as well drained — but another 62% drains differently: 27% moderately well drained, 17% very poorly drained.
Celina is the most extensive named soil at 24% of mapped acres, then Miamian (21%) and Kokomo (15%).
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 Preble County
Each reading below is measured for Preble 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 Preble County are well drained, in hydrologic group C/D — 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 Preble County runs about pH 6.2–6.5, 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
Wet ground
MeasuredAbout 20% of Preble County is mapped as hydric — wetland — soil.
If your lot falls in one of those pockets, a standard in-ground bed will fight waterlogging all season, and roots that need air will struggle.
Check how your own ground drains before you dig; raised beds or moisture-loving plantings turn a wet corner from a problem into a niche.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredPreble County 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
The kind of country Preble County is in
Preble County sits in the Eastern Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Preble County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Preble County's own USDA zone 6a and its own 205-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 Ohio profile.
Is it too late to plant in Preble County?
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 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 31 — 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 Preble County
Survey cells within 31 miles of Preble County checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 38 miles off. What to watch for.
- monarch butterfly39 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Preble County
USGS estimates 186,440 lb of Glyphosate on Preble County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (132,193 lb) and Atrazine (84,559 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 Preble County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Preble County — 247 documented sites across 5 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 13 Toxics Release Inventory facilities. Active industrial facilities reporting chemical releases to air, water, and land.
There's a meaningful federal record across Preble County — worth a look before you plant food, not a reason to hold back from growing. Proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. A soil test before new food beds is the sensible precaution here, and the map shows exactly which sites sit where, so you can see what's actually near you.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Preble County
Closest first, across Preble County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- EATON ONE STOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- STRANGE'S BOAT SHOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- CARTER DALE MOTORSBrownfields · 2400 ft
- ELLIOTT'S DRY CLEANERSBrownfields · 2500 ft
- BEODDY MARA-MART SOUTHUnderground Storage Tanks · 2600 ft
- SAMMY'S FOOD MARTUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- STEINKE TRACTOR SALESUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- DOLLAR GENERAL STORE #7077Brownfields · 0.6 mi
- CENTURYLINKUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- RODEFELD'S AUTO PARTSUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- EATON WASTEWATER PLANTUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- FUEL MART #646Underground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Preble 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 Preble County.
Total Sites
247
across Preble County
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
13 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
across Preble County
Severity Distribution
across Preble County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Preble County, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 82 sites across Preble 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 Preble 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 Preble County average
Your land is one point inside Preble County
Everything above resolves to Preble County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 272K 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 Preble County Average
Preble County Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Preble County
- ●One soil character for all of Preble County
- ●Frost dates read at Preble County's scale: Apr 9 to Oct 31
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Preble County's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Preble County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Preble County, Ohio — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Preble County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Preble County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Preble County average
How we know this about Preble 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 Preble County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Preble County
When does frost risk typically end in Preble County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Preble 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 Preble County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Preble County sees about 205 frost-free days — roughly Apr 9 through Oct 31, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 30 to Oct 17, about 170 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Preble County?
The federal record around Preble County is a meaningful one — 247 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (99), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 miles 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.
Everything above is measured at Preble County's scale — its 6a band and its 205-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Preble 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 Ohio's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Preble County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Preble County's own scale — its own ~205-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 247 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Preble County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Preble County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~205-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Preble CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 247 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Preble County's boundary and the 271,505 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~205-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Preble County sitting wholly inside the Eastern Corn Belt PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Preble County for a tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Preble County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Ohio grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Ohio
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Preble County — the ~205 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 Preble County's 271,505 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 247 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 Preble Countyread your own land →