Douglas, AZ 85617 Frost Dates
85617, near Douglas, AZ: the frost window
Around 04/06 is the usual last spring frost, about 221 days away. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 11/10, roughly 215 days after the last spring frost.
Douglas sits in USDA Zone 8b (15 to 20°F average annual minimum). The dates above are NOAA's 1991-2020 normal at the nearest reporting station, a 30-year average, not a forecast.
Stretching the season past the first frost
Douglas's growing season runs out in roughly 11 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
04/06 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 03/12 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 04/24 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Douglas against the rest of the dataset
At roughly 215 frost-free days, Douglas places 14,045 of 40,283 ZIP codes in this dataset. Within AZ, it ranks 372 of 506.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 85617: the frost range, on how to read the range around Douglas's dates instead of trusting one, and local microclimates, on what one yard in Douglas can differ from the 85617 normal.