Zionsville, Indiana
Zionsville soil temperature
How warm the ground is today about two inches (6 cm) down, the seedbed gardeners plant into, shown against the year’s normal range, with a day-by-day table and the week ahead.
Soil right now in Zionsville
Friday, July 3, 2026Modeled for the center of town, not a probe in your yard. A sunny raised bed runs warmer, a shaded or clay spot cooler.
How the soil is trending
The forecast week ahead and the days behind, each compared with today’s reading.
| When | Low | Soil (2 in) | High | vs. today |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Today Fri, Jul 3 · forecast | 75°F | 81°F | 87°F | — |
| Tomorrow Sat, Jul 4 · forecast | 75°F | 80°F | 86°F | −2°F |
| In 3 days Mon, Jul 6 · forecast | 69°F | 75°F | 82°F | −6°F |
| In a week Fri, Jul 10 | — | — | — | — |
| When | Low | Soil (2 in) | High | vs. today |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Today Fri, Jul 3 · forecast | 75°F | 81°F | 87°F | — |
| Yesterday Thu, Jul 2 · forecast | 74°F | 81°F | 88°F | −1°F |
| A week ago Fri, Jun 26 | 66°F | 69°F | 73°F | −12°F |
| A month ago Wed, Jun 3 | 59°F | 75°F | 92°F | −6°F |
| Three months ago Fri, Apr 3 | 60°F | 64°F | 70°F | −17°F |
| A year ago Thu, Jul 3 | 70°F | 79°F | 89°F | −3°F |
2026 soil temperature
Brick line: this year’s reading. Green band: the typical range per date over 1991–2020. Dashed end: the past few days and week-ahead forecast. Hover or drag to read any day.
The year so far
Turning points of the 2026 soil year: seasonal lows and highs, and the spring dates the ground first crossed the planting thresholds.
When the soil is warm enough to plant
Read against the seedbed (~2 in) reading above. “Plant at” is the practical floor; “best” is the optimum germination range.
| Crop | Plant at | Best | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Peas | 40°F | 40–75°F | Germinates from 40°F; hardy, weeks before the last frost. |
| Lettuce | 40°F | 40–80°F | Germinates as low as 35°F; semi-hardy. |
| Spinach | 45°F | 45–75°F | Germinates as low as 35°F; hardy. |
| Potatoes | 45°F | — | Seed pieces; hardy. |
| Onions | 50°F | 50–95°F | Sets or seed; hardy. |
| Sweet corn | 60°F | 70–86°F | Floor ~50°F, but wait for 60°F to avoid seed rot. |
| Beans | 60°F | 60–85°F | Tender; plant after the last frost. |
| Tomatoes | 60°F | 60–85°F | Seed floor 50°F; set transplants out when nights hold 60–65°F. |
| Peppers | 60°F | 65–95°F | Very tender. |
| Cucumbers, squash & melons | 60°F | 70–95°F | Very tender. |
Lawn timing
| Crabgrass pre-emergent | Put it down before the soil hits the upper 50s°F. Crabgrass germinates at 57–64°F an inch down (Purdue), usually early-to-mid April here. This page’s 2-inch reading runs cooler than that 1-inch number, so go by the calendar and forsythia bloom rather than waiting on it, or you’ll be late. |
|---|---|
| Preventive grub control | Calendar, not soil temp: early-to-mid July, around egg hatch (Purdue E-271); water in about ½ inch. |
| Fall lawn seeding | Best late August through mid-September, when the soil is still upper 60s to mid-70s°F for fast germination, with enough warm weeks to root before the late-October frost. By October it’s in the 50s with little time to establish. |
Sources: germination, Purdue Extension HO-186-W; crabgrass, Purdue Turfgrass Science; grubs, Purdue E-271; zone, 2023 USDA map; frost dates, NWS Indianapolis normals.
No soil readings for May 2030. The record runs from 1991 to about a week ago, plus the week-ahead forecast.
How this is built
These are modeled estimates for the center of Zionsville (about 39.951° N, 86.262° W), about two inches down, not a probe in your yard, which can run several degrees off. History back to 1991 is ECMWF’s ERA5-Land reanalysis; the last few days and the week-ahead outlook are the Open-Meteo forecast model (the dashed line). No modeled depth matches the 2-inch or 4-inch garden standards, so we report the ~2-inch seedbed band and label it plainly rather than imply false precision. Updated daily.
Weather data by Open-Meteo.com, used under CC BY 4.0.