Bloomington, IL 61704 Frost Dates
Bloomington, IL: when does the frost end?
Around 04/25 is the usual last spring frost, about 240 days away. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 10/16, roughly 172 days after the last spring frost.
Bloomington 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
With roughly 7 weeks until Bloomington's first fall frost, a row cover or cold frame is what stretches the last few weeks of harvest here.
Why 04/25 isn't a guarantee
04/25 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 04/11 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 05/11 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Bloomington against the rest of the dataset
At roughly 172 frost-free days, Bloomington places 28,129 of 40,283 ZIP codes in this dataset. Within IL, it ranks 1,329 of 1,548.
Learn more
Before leaning on 61704's figures: local microclimates explains what one yard in Bloomington can differ from the 61704 normal, while zone vs. frost date explains why Zone 6a and Bloomington's frost date answer different questions.