Red Oak, NC 27868 Frost Dates
27868, near Red Oak, NC: the frost window
Typically, the last spring freeze lands around 04/01, roughly 216 days out. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 11/05, roughly 219 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 Red Oak, not a forecast for this year.
Stretching the season past the first frost
Red Oak's growing season runs out in roughly 10 weeks — a cold frame or greenhouse kit is the usual way to keep cool-weather crops going past the first frost.
Why 04/01 isn't a guarantee
04/01 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 03/16 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 04/16 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Red Oak against the rest of the dataset
About 219 days separate Red Oak's last and first frost, putting it 13,024 of 40,283 ZIP codes nationally. Within NC, it ranks 622 of 1,078.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 27868: zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 8a and Red Oak's frost date answer different questions, and the frost range, on how to read the range around Red Oak's dates instead of trusting one.