Mesic, NC 28537 Frost Dates
28537, near Mesic, NC: the frost window
Typically, the last spring freeze lands around 03/08, roughly 192 days out. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 12/05, roughly 272 days after the last spring frost.
Mesic sits in USDA Zone 8b (15 to 20°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
Mesic'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 03/08 isn't a guarantee
03/08 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 02/12 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 03/28 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Mesic against the rest of the dataset
At roughly 272 frost-free days, Mesic places 5,411 of 40,283 ZIP codes in this dataset. Within NC, it ranks 15 of 1,078.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 28537: zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 8b and Mesic's frost date answer different questions, and the frost range, on how to read the range around Mesic's dates instead of trusting one.