Cranston, RI 02857 Frost Dates
02857, near Cranston, RI: the frost window
Around 04/11 is the usual last spring frost, about 226 days away. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 10/30, roughly 199 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 Cranston, not a forecast for this year.
Stretching the season past the first frost
Cranston's growing season runs out in roughly 9 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
04/11 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 04/01 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 04/23 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Cranston against the rest of the dataset
At roughly 199 frost-free days, Cranston places 17,992 of 40,283 ZIP codes in this dataset. Within RI, it ranks 29 of 79.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 02857: zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 6b and Cranston's frost date answer different questions, and the frost range, on how to read the range around Cranston's dates instead of trusting one.