Vestavia Hills, AL 35242 Frost Dates
35242, near Vestavia Hills, AL: the frost window
Around 03/21 is the usual last spring frost, about 205 days away. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 11/11, roughly 236 days after the last spring frost.
Vestavia Hills 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
Vestavia Hills's growing season runs out in roughly 11 weeks — a cold frame or greenhouse kit is the usual way to keep cool-weather crops going past the first frost.
How much risk comes with planting early here
03/21 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 02/28 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 04/08 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Vestavia Hills against the rest of the dataset
Vestavia Hills's growing season runs about 236 days, ranking 9,313 of 40,283 US ZIP codes measured here, longest to shortest. Within AL, it ranks 360 of 809.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 35242: local microclimates, on what one yard in Vestavia Hills can differ from the 35242 normal, and zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 8b and Vestavia Hills's frost date answer different questions.