Andalusia, IL 61232 Frost Dates
61232, near Andalusia, IL: the frost window
Typically, the last spring freeze lands around 04/24, roughly 239 days out. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 10/18, roughly 176 days after the last spring frost.
Andalusia sits in USDA Zone 5b (-15 to -10°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
Andalusia'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.
The actual range around Andalusia's last frost
04/24 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 04/09 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 05/09 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Andalusia against the rest of the dataset
Andalusia's growing season runs about 176 days, ranking 26,529 of 40,283 US ZIP codes measured here, longest to shortest. Within IL, it ranks 1,184 of 1,548.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 61232: local microclimates, on what one yard in Andalusia can differ from the 61232 normal, and zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 5b and Andalusia's frost date answer different questions.