Shasta Lake, CA 96019 Frost Dates
Shasta Lake, CA: when does the frost end?
Typically, the last spring freeze lands around 03/03, roughly 187 days out. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 11/21, roughly 261 days after the last spring frost.
Zone 9b (25 to 30°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 Shasta Lake, not a forecast for this year.
Stretching the season past the first frost
With roughly 12 weeks until Shasta Lake's first fall frost, a row cover or cold frame is what stretches the last few weeks of harvest here.
Why 03/03 isn't a guarantee
03/03 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 01/31 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 04/09 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Shasta Lake against the rest of the dataset
At roughly 261 frost-free days, Shasta Lake places 6,394 of 40,283 ZIP codes in this dataset. Within CA, it ranks 2,043 of 2,555.
Learn more
Before leaning on 96019's figures: local microclimates explains what one yard in Shasta Lake can differ from the 96019 normal, while zone vs. frost date explains why Zone 9b and Shasta Lake's frost date answer different questions.