Broadlands, IL 61816 Frost Dates
61816, near Broadlands, IL: the frost window
Typically, the last spring freeze lands around 04/19, roughly 234 days out. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 10/19, roughly 181 days after the last spring frost.
Zone 6a (-10 to -5°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 Broadlands, not a forecast for this year.
Stretching the season past the first frost
Broadlands'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.
How much risk comes with planting early here
04/19 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 04/04 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 05/03 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Broadlands against the rest of the dataset
At roughly 181 frost-free days, Broadlands places 24,710 of 40,283 ZIP codes in this dataset. Within IL, it ranks 940 of 1,548.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 61816: local microclimates, on what one yard in Broadlands can differ from the 61816 normal, and zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 6a and Broadlands's frost date answer different questions.