Vinton, IA 52349 Frost Dates
52349, near Vinton, IA: the frost window
Typically, the last spring freeze lands around 04/28, roughly 243 days out. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 10/12, roughly 166 days after the last spring frost.
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 Vinton, not a forecast for this year.
Stretching the season past the first frost
Vinton's growing season runs out in roughly 6 weeks — a cold frame or greenhouse kit is the usual way to keep cool-weather crops going past the first frost.
The actual range around Vinton's last frost
04/28 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 04/14 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 05/13 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Vinton against the rest of the dataset
Vinton's growing season runs about 166 days, ranking 30,365 of 40,283 US ZIP codes measured here, longest to shortest. Within IA, it ranks 454 of 1,042.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 52349: the frost range, on how to read the range around Vinton's dates instead of trusting one, and local microclimates, on what one yard in Vinton can differ from the 52349 normal.