Traverse City, MI 49686 Frost Dates
49686, near Traverse City, MI: the frost window
The last spring frost here typically falls around 05/12, about 257 days from today. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 10/16, roughly 155 days after the last spring frost.
Traverse City sits in USDA Zone 6b (-5 to 0°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
Traverse City's growing season runs out in roughly 7 weeks — a cold frame or greenhouse kit is the usual way to keep cool-weather crops going past the first frost.
Why 05/12 isn't a guarantee
05/12 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 04/26 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 05/27 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Traverse City against the rest of the dataset
About 155 days separate Traverse City's last and first frost, putting it 33,931 of 40,283 ZIP codes nationally. Within MI, it ranks 774 of 1,153.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 49686: local microclimates, on what one yard in Traverse City can differ from the 49686 normal, and zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 6b and Traverse City's frost date answer different questions.