Lancaster, PA 17564 Frost Dates
Lancaster, PA: when does the frost end?
The last spring frost here typically falls around 04/18, about 233 days from today. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 10/25, roughly 186 days after the last spring frost.
Lancaster 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
With roughly 8 weeks until Lancaster's first fall frost, a row cover or cold frame is what stretches the last few weeks of harvest here.
The actual range around Lancaster's last frost
04/18 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 04/04 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 05/05 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Lancaster against the rest of the dataset
About 186 days separate Lancaster's last and first frost, putting it 22,691 of 40,283 ZIP codes nationally. Within PA, it ranks 629 of 2,088.
Learn more
Before leaning on 17564's figures: zone vs. frost date explains why Zone 7a and Lancaster's frost date answer different questions, while the frost range explains how to read the range around Lancaster's dates instead of trusting one.