Fordyce, NE 68736 Frost Dates
68736, near Fordyce, NE: the frost window
Around 04/30 is the usual last spring frost, about 245 days away. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 10/08, roughly 160 days after the last spring frost.
The USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map puts Fordyce in Zone 5a (-20 to -15°F average annual minimum); frost dates are NOAA's 1991-2020 station normal, not this year's forecast.
Stretching the season past the first frost
Fordyce's growing season runs out in roughly 6 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 Fordyce's last frost
04/30 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 04/16 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 05/13 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Fordyce against the rest of the dataset
At roughly 160 frost-free days, Fordyce places 32,536 of 40,283 ZIP codes in this dataset. Within NE, it ranks 394 of 605.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 68736: local microclimates, on what one yard in Fordyce can differ from the 68736 normal, and zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 5a and Fordyce's frost date answer different questions.