Kenosha County, in Wisconsin, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
On paper, cabbage, blueberry, lavender, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Kenosha County lies within the Southeastern Wisconsin Lakeshore (Milwaukee Metro) — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Kenosha County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Kenosha 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 Kenosha County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Kenosha County — the short answer
Kenosha County, Wisconsin: USDA zone 5b, about 208 days between hard freezes, across 174K acres.
- USDA zone
- 5b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 9
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 3
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~208
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 174K 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 5b is Kenosha County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Kenosha County's 208-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Kenosha County
Across a year, Kenosha County accumulates about 2,460 growing degree days above 50°F, about 310 more than the middle Wisconsin county — ahead of 64 of Wisconsin’s 72 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 Kenosha County
Across Kenosha County, the ground is predominantly Alfisols, where Ozaukee, Ashkum, and Markham are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally moderately well drained with a silt loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 6.2–7.0, neutral. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C soils.
Soil order
Alfisols
Drainage
Moderately well drained
Prime farmland
40%
Hydric soils
26%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Kenosha County
The USDA soil survey maps 32% of Kenosha County as moderately well drained — but another 62% drains differently: 19% somewhat poorly drained, 16% poorly drained.
Ozaukee is the most extensive named soil at 18% of mapped acres, then Ashkum (10%) and Markham (9%).
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 Kenosha County
Each reading below is measured for Kenosha 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 Kenosha County are moderately well drained, in hydrologic group C — roughly the middle of the drainage range.
This is close to the middle most vegetables prefer: it holds enough water to carry a crop between rains without staying waterlogged. The catch is that a wet spring or a low corner can still tip it soggy.
Plant on the site as-is for most crops, but keep the lowest, slowest-draining beds for moisture-tolerant plantings.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Kenosha County runs about pH 6.2–7.0, 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 26% of Kenosha 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
MeasuredKenosha County runs about 208 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 Kenosha County is in
Kenosha County spans 2 EPA Level III ecoregions — Southeastern Wisconsin Till Plains (58%) and Central Corn Belt Plains (42%). Which one your land falls in changes what grows wild there and how the ground behaves, and a county-wide answer cannot tell you which.
What Grows in Kenosha County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Kenosha County's own USDA zone 5b and its own 208-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 Wisconsin profile.
Is it too late to plant in Kenosha County?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. 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 Nov 3 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. There is slack in a calendar like this — late plantings, second rounds of favorites, and a fall bench that keeps beds working.
Documented around Kenosha County
Spotted lanternfly documented 30 miles from Kenosha County, first recorded 2023. What to watch for.
- Japanese beetle13 documented records
- monarch butterfly16 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Kenosha County
USGS estimates 27,501 lb of Glyphosate on Kenosha County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (11,108 lb) and Metolachlor-s (10,094 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 Kenosha County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Kenosha County — 986 documented sites across 6 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 9 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed). Sites tracked in EPA's Superfund program — from assessment-stage CERCLIS entries to confirmed National Priorities List cleanup sites.
There's a meaningful federal record across Kenosha 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 Kenosha County
Closest first, across Kenosha County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- First Student Inc # 20737Underground Storage Tanks · 450 ft
- FIRST STUDENT INC 20737Brownfields · 500 ft
- Sports Plaza Mobil MartUnderground Storage Tanks · 650 ft
- LAMINATED PRODUCTS, INC.Brownfields · 1000 ft
- LAMINATED PRODUCTS, INC.Toxics Release Inventory · 1000 ft
- Laminated Products IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- KWIK TRIP 371Brownfields · 1100 ft
- Kwik Trip #371Underground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- RILEY CONSTRUCITON COBrownfields · 1200 ft
- RILEY CONSTRUCTION CO INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
- RCK FOODS - ROUNDY'S COMMISSARYBrownfields · 1600 ft
- KENOSHA COMMISSARYToxics Release Inventory · 1600 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Kenosha 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 Kenosha County.
Total Sites
986
across Kenosha County
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
9 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
across Kenosha County
Severity Distribution
across Kenosha County
Highest-Severity Sites
Know Before You Grow
- •Underground tanks leak petroleum as they age — near a former filling station, test the soil.
- •Near a brownfield, raised beds of imported soil give your food clean ground.
- •TRI facilities report what they release. Check the wind — downwind beds catch more of it.
Check your specific parcel in Kenosha 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 Kenosha County average
Your land is one point inside Kenosha County
Everything above resolves to Kenosha County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 174K 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 Kenosha County Average
Kenosha County Average
- ●USDA Zones 5b, averaged across Kenosha County
- ●One soil character for all of Kenosha County
- ●Frost dates read at Kenosha County's scale: Apr 9 to Nov 3
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Kenosha County's 5b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Kenosha County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Kenosha County, Wisconsin — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Kenosha County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Kenosha County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Kenosha County average
How we know this about Kenosha 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 Kenosha County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Kenosha County
When does frost risk typically end in Kenosha County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Kenosha 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 Kenosha County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Kenosha County sees about 208 frost-free days — roughly Apr 9 through Nov 3, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 30 to Oct 20, about 173 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Kenosha County?
The federal record around Kenosha County is a meaningful one — 986 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (547), 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.
Everything above is measured at Kenosha County's scale — its 5b band and its 208-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Kenosha 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 Wisconsin's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Kenosha County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Kenosha County's own scale — its own ~208-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 986 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Kenosha County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Kenosha County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~208-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Kenosha CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 986 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile outFederal environmental registers
- Kenosha County's boundary and the 173,973 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5b and a ~208-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The 2 ecoregions Kenosha County spans, Southeastern Wisconsin Till Plains the largestUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Kenosha County for 2 tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Kenosha County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Wisconsin grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Wisconsin
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Kenosha County — the ~208 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 Kenosha County's 173,973 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 986 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 Kenosha Countyread your own land →