Platte Center, NE 68602 Frost Dates
68602, near Platte Center, NE: the frost window
Typically, the last spring freeze lands around 04/21, roughly 236 days out. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 10/15, roughly 174 days after the last spring frost.
Zone 5b (-15 to -10°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 Platte Center, not a forecast for this year.
Stretching the season past the first frost
Platte Center'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
04/21 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 04/07 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 05/05 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Platte Center against the rest of the dataset
Platte Center's growing season runs about 174 days, ranking 27,608 of 40,283 US ZIP codes measured here, longest to shortest. Within NE, it ranks 135 of 605.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 68602: zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 5b and Platte Center's frost date answer different questions, and the frost range, on how to read the range around Platte Center's dates instead of trusting one.