Chincoteague, VA 23356 Frost Dates
23356, near Chincoteague, VA: the frost window
Typically, the last spring freeze lands around 03/31, roughly 215 days out. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 11/11, roughly 225 days after the last spring frost.
Chincoteague sits in USDA Zone 8a (10 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
Chincoteague's growing season runs out in roughly 11 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
03/31 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 03/17 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 04/13 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Chincoteague against the rest of the dataset
About 225 days separate Chincoteague's last and first frost, putting it 11,420 of 40,283 ZIP codes nationally. Within VA, it ranks 179 of 1,178.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 23356: zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 8a and Chincoteague's frost date answer different questions, and the frost range, on how to read the range around Chincoteague's dates instead of trusting one.