Nashua, IA 50658 Frost Dates
When can you plant in Nashua, IA?
Typically, the last spring freeze lands around 04/30, roughly 245 days out. The first fall frost typically arrives around 10/06, about 157 frost-free days later.
Zone 5a (-20 to -15°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 Nashua, not a forecast for this year.
What to do before the first frost
About 6 weeks of growing season left in Nashua before the first fall frost — a cold frame or row cover can stretch harvest weeks past that date.
The actual range around Nashua's last frost
04/30 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Plant by 04/15 and you're betting against frost in roughly 9 years out of 10. 05/14 is the safer bet, historically only a 1-in-10 chance of frost that late.
How Nashua compares
At roughly 157 frost-free days, Nashua places 33,353 of 40,283 ZIP codes in this dataset. Within IA, it ranks 834 of 1,042.
Learn more
zone vs. frost date covers why Zone 5a and Nashua's frost date answer different questions. the frost range covers how to read the range around Nashua's dates instead of trusting one.