Mason, MI 48980 Frost Dates
Mason, MI: when does the frost end?
Typically, the last spring freeze lands around 04/28, roughly 243 days out. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 10/17, roughly 173 days after the last spring frost.
Zone 6a (-10 to -5°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 Mason, not a forecast for this year.
Stretching the season past the first frost
With roughly 7 weeks until Mason's first fall frost, a row cover or cold frame is what stretches the last few weeks of harvest here.
The actual range around Mason's last frost
04/28 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 04/13 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 05/16 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Mason against the rest of the dataset
About 173 days separate Mason's last and first frost, putting it 27,829 of 40,283 ZIP codes nationally. Within MI, it ranks 220 of 1,153.
Learn more
Before leaning on 48980's figures: zone vs. frost date explains why Zone 6a and Mason's frost date answer different questions, while the frost range explains how to read the range around Mason's dates instead of trusting one.