West Peoria, IL 61629 Frost Dates
61629, near West Peoria, IL: the frost window
Typically, the last spring freeze lands around 04/16, roughly 231 days out. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 10/23, roughly 189 days after the last spring frost.
West Peoria sits in USDA Zone 6a (-10 to -5°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
West Peoria'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.
How much risk comes with planting early here
04/16 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 04/02 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 05/04 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
West Peoria against the rest of the dataset
About 189 days separate West Peoria's last and first frost, putting it 21,565 of 40,283 ZIP codes nationally. Within IL, it ranks 597 of 1,548.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 61629: local microclimates, on what one yard in West Peoria can differ from the 61629 normal, and zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 6a and West Peoria's frost date answer different questions.