Swanton, VT 05488 Frost Dates
05488, near Swanton, VT: the frost window
Typically, the last spring freeze lands around 05/01, roughly 246 days out. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 10/12, roughly 161 days after the last spring frost.
Swanton 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
Swanton'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
05/01 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 04/20 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.
Swanton against the rest of the dataset
About 161 days separate Swanton's last and first frost, putting it 32,063 of 40,283 ZIP codes nationally. Within VT, it ranks 38 of 330.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 05488: zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 5a and Swanton's frost date answer different questions, and the frost range, on how to read the range around Swanton's dates instead of trusting one.