Menominee County, in Wisconsin, sits in USDA hardiness zone 4b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Growers here do well with cabbage, cranberry, turkish rocket, 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
Menominee County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Menominee 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 Menominee County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Menominee County — the short answer
Menominee County, Wisconsin: USDA zone 4b, about 158 days between hard freezes, across 229K acres.
- USDA zone
- 4b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- May 4
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 9
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~158
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 229K 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 4b is Menominee County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Menominee County's 158-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Menominee County
Across a year, Menominee County accumulates about 1,887 growing degree days above 50°F, about 263 fewer than the middle Wisconsin county — ahead of 16 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 Menominee County
Across Menominee County, the ground is predominantly Spodosols, where Padus, Frechette, and Kennan are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a sandy loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 5.3–5.9, moderately acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group A soils.
Soil order
Spodosols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
20%
Hydric soils
15%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Menominee County
The USDA soil survey maps 40% of Menominee County as well drained — but another 58% drains differently: 16% excessively drained, 14% moderately well drained.
Padus is the most extensive named soil at 15% of mapped acres, then Frechette (9%) and Kennan (6%).
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 Menominee County
Each reading below is measured for Menominee 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 Menominee County are well drained, in hydrologic group A — 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 Menominee County runs about pH 5.3–5.9, on the acidic side.
Blueberries, potatoes, and rhododendrons thrive in it, but most vegetables start locking out nutrients below about pH 6.0 and grow pale and stunted no matter how much you feed them.
A measured lime application raises pH for the crops that need it — but test first, because the right rate depends on your own soil, not the county average.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredMenominee County runs about 158 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
MeasuredMenominee County sits in USDA hardiness zone 4b.
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 Menominee County is in
Menominee County spans 2 EPA Level III ecoregions — North Central Hardwood Forests (91%) and Northern Lakes and Forests (9%). 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 Menominee County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Menominee County's own USDA zone 4b and its own 158-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 Menominee 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 Apr 6; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near May 4 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 9 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. The tail of the season still works: sixty-day crops into late summer, quick greens after, garlic last of all.
What gets applied to farmland in Menominee County
USGS estimates 84 lb of Acetochlor on Menominee County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Glyphosate (77 lb) and Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (33 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 Menominee County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Menominee County — 148 documented sites across 5 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 1 mining site. Historic and active mines that may leach heavy metals like arsenic, lead, and cadmium.
The federal record across Menominee 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 Menominee County
Closest first, across Menominee County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- ThunderbirdUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- THUNDERBIRD OF MENOMINEE INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- ME-29/15E/25-0060Nitrate · 2.7 mi
- ME-29/16E/19-0083Nitrate · 3.0 mi
- ME-29/16E/19-0085Nitrate · 3.0 mi
- MENOMINEE COUNTY HWY DEPTUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.2 mi
- ME-28/15E/03-0052Nitrate · 3.5 mi
- ME-29/16E/18-0056Nitrate · 3.5 mi
- ME-28/15E/11-0131Nitrate · 4.9 mi
- ME-28/15E/14-0080Nitrate · 5.5 mi
- ME-28/15E/07-0081Nitrate · 5.5 mi
- ME-28/15E/14-0034Nitrate · 5.6 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Menominee 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 Menominee County.
Sources Checked
across Menominee County
Severity Distribution
across Menominee County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Menominee County, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 126 sites across Menominee County. Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
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 Menominee 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 Menominee County average
Your land is one point inside Menominee County
Everything above resolves to Menominee County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 229K 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 Menominee County Average
Menominee County Average
- ●USDA Zones 4b, averaged across Menominee County
- ●One soil character for all of Menominee County
- ●Frost dates read at Menominee County's scale: May 4 to Oct 9
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Menominee County's 4b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Menominee County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Menominee County, Wisconsin — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Menominee County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Menominee County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Menominee County average
How we know this about Menominee 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 Menominee County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Menominee County
When does frost risk typically end in Menominee County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Menominee County typically lands around May 4, 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 25.
How long is the growing season in Menominee County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Menominee County sees about 158 frost-free days — roughly May 4 through Oct 9, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 25 to Sep 25, about 123 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Menominee County?
The federal record around Menominee County shows 148 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (126), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 2.2 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 Menominee County's scale — its 4b band and its 158-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Menominee 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 Menominee County’s own scale
8 of the readings below were taken at Menominee County's own scale — its own ~158-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 148 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Menominee County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 4bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Menominee County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~158-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Menominee CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 148 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 2.2 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Menominee County's boundary and the 228,873 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 4b and a ~158-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The 2 ecoregions Menominee County spans, North Central Hardwood Forests the largestUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Menominee 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 Menominee County — the ~158 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 Menominee County's 228,873 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 148 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 Menominee Countyread your own land →