Salem, WV 26426 Frost Dates
26426, near Salem, WV: the frost window
The last spring frost here typically falls around 04/28, about 243 days from today. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 10/21, roughly 176 days after the last spring frost.
Zone 6b (-5 to 0°F average annual minimum) comes from the USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map; the frost dates above are the 1991-2020 normal at the nearest reporting NOAA station for Salem, not a forecast for this year.
Stretching the season past the first frost
Salem's growing season runs out in roughly 8 weeks — a cold frame or greenhouse kit is the usual way to keep cool-weather crops going past the first frost.
The actual range around Salem's last frost
04/28 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 04/14 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.
Salem against the rest of the dataset
About 176 days separate Salem's last and first frost, putting it 26,513 of 40,283 ZIP codes nationally. Within WV, it ranks 596 of 885.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 26426: local microclimates, on what one yard in Salem can differ from the 26426 normal, and zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 6b and Salem's frost date answer different questions.