Framingham, MA 01776 Frost Dates
01776, near Framingham, MA: the frost window
Typically, the last spring freeze lands around 05/02, roughly 247 days out. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 10/06, roughly 156 days after the last spring frost.
Zone 6b (-5 to 0°F average annual minimum) comes from the USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map; the frost dates above are the 1991-2020 normal at the nearest reporting NOAA station for Framingham, not a forecast for this year.
Stretching the season past the first frost
Framingham's growing season runs out in roughly 6 weeks — a cold frame or greenhouse kit is the usual way to keep cool-weather crops going past the first frost.
How much risk comes with planting early here
05/02 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 04/22 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 05/16 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Framingham against the rest of the dataset
At roughly 156 frost-free days, Framingham places 33,502 of 40,283 ZIP codes in this dataset. Within MA, it ranks 603 of 712.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 01776: local microclimates, on what one yard in Framingham can differ from the 01776 normal, and zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 6b and Framingham's frost date answer different questions.