Frost dates for Tacoma #1, Washington
Half of years have their last spring frost by March 8 — but 1 year in 10 still frosts after March 31.
Every other site gives you one date. A frost date is not a date: it is a percentile from 30 years of records at a nearby weather station, and planting to the median means losing the crop in half of years. Both numbers are below, so you can choose the risk yourself.
The odds
- Frost this late in 1 year in 10
- March 31
- 1 year in 5
- March 23
- 3 years in 10
- March 17
- 2 years in 5
- March 12
- Half of years (the median)
- March 8
- First fall freeze, typical year
- November 14
- Growing season
- about 250 days
- Hardiness zones nearby
- 8b, 9a
Where these numbers come from
NOAA NCEI 1991–2020 Climate Normals, station Tacoma #1 (USC00458278), at 47.25, -122.41. These are that station's own records, unshifted. The further your garden is from it, the less exactly they describe your ground — the planner resolves the nearest station to your own ZIP and lowers its confidence with distance, rather than presenting one number as if it were measured in your yard.
Cold air also pools in low ground on the clear, still nights when frost happens, so a hollow can freeze while a slope a hundred metres away does not. No table can know that about your garden. Your own logged frosts eventually can.
ZIP codes nearest this station
98001, 98002, 98003, 98023, 98030, 98031, 98032, 98047, 98148, 98158, 98166, 98188, 98198, 98338, 98354, 98360, 98371, 98372, 98373, 98374, 98375, 98387, 98390, 98391, 98402, 98403, 98404, 98405, 98408, 98409, 98416, 98418, 98421, 98422, 98424, 98438, 98439, 98443, 98444, 98445, 98446, 98447, 98499, 98558, 98580.