Swansea, IL 62226 Frost Dates
62226, near Swansea, IL: the frost window
The last spring frost here typically falls around 04/12, about 227 days from today. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 10/20, roughly 189 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 Swansea, not a forecast for this year.
Stretching the season past the first frost
Swansea'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.
The actual range around Swansea's last frost
04/12 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 03/28 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 04/28 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Swansea against the rest of the dataset
Swansea's growing season runs about 189 days, ranking 21,452 of 40,283 US ZIP codes measured here, longest to shortest. Within IL, it ranks 574 of 1,548.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 62226: zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 7a and Swansea's frost date answer different questions, and the frost range, on how to read the range around Swansea's dates instead of trusting one.