FrostDateCheck

Shorewood, IL 60431 Frost Dates

60431, near Shorewood, IL: the frost window

Zone 5b

The last spring frost here typically falls around 04/19, about 234 days from today. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 10/25, roughly 188 days after the last spring frost.

The USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map puts Shorewood in Zone 5b (-15 to -10°F average annual minimum); frost dates are NOAA's 1991-2020 station normal, not this year's forecast.

Stretching the season past the first frost

Shorewood's growing season runs out in roughly 8 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 Shorewood's last frost

04/19 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 04/03 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 05/07 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.

Shorewood against the rest of the dataset

About 188 days separate Shorewood's last and first frost, putting it 21,881 of 40,283 ZIP codes nationally. Within IL, it ranks 667 of 1,548.

Learn more

Two guides worth reading on 60431: the frost range, on how to read the range around Shorewood's dates instead of trusting one, and local microclimates, on what one yard in Shorewood can differ from the 60431 normal.