Gardner, MA 01452 Frost Dates
Gardner, MA: when does the frost end?
Around 05/12 is the usual last spring frost, about 257 days away. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 10/01, roughly 141 days after the last spring frost.
The USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map puts Gardner in Zone 5b (-15 to -10°F average annual minimum); frost dates are NOAA's 1991-2020 station normal, not this year's forecast.
Stretching the season past the first frost
With roughly 5 weeks until Gardner's first fall frost, a row cover or cold frame is what stretches the last few weeks of harvest here.
The actual range around Gardner's last frost
05/12 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 04/27 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 05/28 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Gardner against the rest of the dataset
At roughly 141 frost-free days, Gardner places 36,869 of 40,283 ZIP codes in this dataset. Within MA, it ranks 702 of 712.
Learn more
Before leaning on 01452's figures: local microclimates explains what one yard in Gardner can differ from the 01452 normal, while zone vs. frost date explains why Zone 5b and Gardner's frost date answer different questions.