Santa Clara, NM 88036 Frost Dates
88036, near Santa Clara, NM: the frost window
Typically, the last spring freeze lands around 04/04, roughly 219 days out. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 11/08, roughly 216 days after the last spring frost.
The USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map puts Santa Clara in Zone 7b (5 to 10°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
Santa Clara's growing season runs out in roughly 10 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 Santa Clara's last frost
04/04 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 03/14 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 04/22 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Santa Clara against the rest of the dataset
Santa Clara's growing season runs about 216 days, ranking 13,830 of 40,283 US ZIP codes measured here, longest to shortest. Within NM, it ranks 74 of 427.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 88036: zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 7b and Santa Clara's frost date answer different questions, and the frost range, on how to read the range around Santa Clara's dates instead of trusting one.