Hanover, PA 17331 Frost Dates
17331, near Hanover, PA: the frost window
Typically, the last spring freeze lands around 04/27, roughly 242 days out. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 10/18, roughly 174 days after the last spring frost.
Hanover sits in USDA Zone 7a (0 to 5°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
Hanover's growing season runs out in roughly 7 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
04/27 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 04/12 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 05/11 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Hanover against the rest of the dataset
At roughly 174 frost-free days, Hanover places 27,379 of 40,283 ZIP codes in this dataset. Within PA, it ranks 1,284 of 2,088.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 17331: local microclimates, on what one yard in Hanover can differ from the 17331 normal, and zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 7a and Hanover's frost date answer different questions.