Southern Shores, NC 27941 Frost Dates
27941, near Southern Shores, NC: the frost window
Typically, the last spring freeze lands around 03/15, roughly 199 days out. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 12/06, roughly 266 days after the last spring frost.
Southern Shores sits in USDA Zone 9a (20 to 25°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
Southern Shores's growing season runs out in roughly 14 weeks — a cold frame or greenhouse kit is the usual way to keep cool-weather crops going past the first frost.
Why 03/15 isn't a guarantee
03/15 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 02/23 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 03/30 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Southern Shores against the rest of the dataset
Southern Shores's growing season runs about 266 days, ranking 5,934 of 40,283 US ZIP codes measured here, longest to shortest. Within NC, it ranks 18 of 1,078.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 27941: zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 9a and Southern Shores's frost date answer different questions, and the frost range, on how to read the range around Southern Shores's dates instead of trusting one.