Lillington, NC 27546 Frost Dates
Lillington, NC: when does the frost end?
Around 03/30 is the usual last spring frost, about 214 days away. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 11/06, roughly 223 days after the last spring frost.
Zone 8a (10 to 15°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 Lillington, not a forecast for this year.
Stretching the season past the first frost
With roughly 10 weeks until Lillington's first fall frost, a row cover or cold frame is what stretches the last few weeks of harvest here.
Why 03/30 isn't a guarantee
03/30 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 03/11 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 04/15 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Lillington against the rest of the dataset
At roughly 223 frost-free days, Lillington places 12,060 of 40,283 ZIP codes in this dataset. Within NC, it ranks 443 of 1,078.
Learn more
Before leaning on 27546's figures: local microclimates explains what one yard in Lillington can differ from the 27546 normal, while zone vs. frost date explains why Zone 8a and Lillington's frost date answer different questions.