Sanford, ME 04004 Frost Dates
04004, near Sanford, ME: the frost window
Typically, the last spring freeze lands around 05/09, roughly 254 days out. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 10/03, roughly 146 days after the last spring frost.
Sanford sits in USDA Zone 5b (-15 to -10°F average annual minimum). The dates above are NOAA's 1991-2020 normal at the nearest reporting station, a 30-year average, not a forecast.
Stretching the season past the first frost
Sanford's growing season runs out in roughly 5 weeks — a cold frame or greenhouse kit is the usual way to keep cool-weather crops going past the first frost.
The actual range around Sanford's last frost
05/09 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 04/28 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 05/22 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Sanford against the rest of the dataset
Sanford's growing season runs about 146 days, ranking 36,018 of 40,283 US ZIP codes measured here, longest to shortest. Within ME, it ranks 333 of 456.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 04004: local microclimates, on what one yard in Sanford can differ from the 04004 normal, and zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 5b and Sanford's frost date answer different questions.