Melbourne, AR 72556 Frost Dates
72556, near Melbourne, AR: the frost window
The last spring frost here typically falls around 04/14, about 229 days from today. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 10/28, roughly 196 days after the last spring frost.
Zone 7b (5 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 Melbourne, not a forecast for this year.
Stretching the season past the first frost
Melbourne's growing season runs out in roughly 9 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
04/14 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 03/30 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 04/29 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Melbourne against the rest of the dataset
About 196 days separate Melbourne's last and first frost, putting it 19,002 of 40,283 ZIP codes nationally. Within AR, it ranks 631 of 687.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 72556: zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 7b and Melbourne's frost date answer different questions, and the frost range, on how to read the range around Melbourne's dates instead of trusting one.