Wood River, IL 62084 Frost Dates
62084, near Wood River, IL: the frost window
Typically, the last spring freeze lands around 04/04, roughly 219 days out. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 11/05, roughly 214 days after the last spring frost.
Zone 7a (0 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 Wood River, not a forecast for this year.
Stretching the season past the first frost
Wood River's growing season runs out in roughly 10 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
04/04 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 03/18 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 04/19 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Wood River against the rest of the dataset
At roughly 214 frost-free days, Wood River places 14,237 of 40,283 ZIP codes in this dataset. Within IL, it ranks 13 of 1,548.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 62084: the frost range, on how to read the range around Wood River's dates instead of trusting one, and local microclimates, on what one yard in Wood River can differ from the 62084 normal.