Barre, VT 05060 Frost Dates
05060, near Barre, VT: the frost window
The last spring frost here typically falls around 05/13, about 258 days from today. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 10/02, roughly 141 days after the last spring frost.
Barre sits in USDA Zone 5a (-20 to -15°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
Barre'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.
Why 05/13 isn't a guarantee
05/13 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 04/30 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 05/29 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Barre against the rest of the dataset
At roughly 141 frost-free days, Barre places 36,889 of 40,283 ZIP codes in this dataset. Within VT, it ranks 152 of 330.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 05060: local microclimates, on what one yard in Barre can differ from the 05060 normal, and zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 5a and Barre's frost date answer different questions.