First frost date?

I am not sure where to post this, so I hope here is okay. This has probably already been answered, and if so, could someone direct me to the place where I can find the answer. When is the first frost date for Durham, NC, 27705? I think I am in zone 7. Thank you.

JesseK

Try this -- http://www.victoryseeds.com/frost/

Good site, Jolene.

Their info is slightly off for us though, JesseK. You can usually use Halloween for our first frost. It is usually not a "killing frost" though and if you want to cover up a few things when it is forecast it's worth it. Normally we'll get several more weeks of warmer weather following that frost.

As a side note, there is a great garden talk show that comes out of the Ag school over in Raleigh. Several of those folks are predicting that we'll most likely not have any severe cold weather this year until December! Won't that be nice!!

Shoe.

That is great to hear Horseshoe. Unfortunately I think I will be moving to CA soon. I am a little anxious about this and so is my husband. But we have to go where the money is. So probably some time around the end of this year we will be moving to So Ca, over in drdon's part of the world. I just wanted to make sure that I had all of my stuff in before it got to cold for them. Thank you both for the wonderful information.

JesseK

Yep...I saw a post where you said you might be moving. Well...if you're moving near DrDon, that's gonna be a great neighbor!

Yes, DrDon lives in the same city that my husband works in. He is only one street down from where my husband works. So I am hoping that I can see his beautiful cacti once in a while and maybe get some great pointers from him. I love all of the pictures he has posted lately of all of his new cacti. Aren't they beautiful?

JesseK

horseshoe
thanks for the easy-to-remember fall frost date around here - halloween. and you're so right about a nip of frost followed by
more warm weather as a common thing. do you have a spring
last frost rule of thumb that's as easy to remember?

i just recently heard of that radio show - i'll hafta tune in.

marsha

JesseK...and be sure to check out his giant worm "bin"...it's a huge pile, very well made and chock full of the richest vermi-compost! (Pics are on the site here somewhere.)

Marsha...most folks consider April 20th the last frost in the Spring. (However, remember, a few yrs back we actually had a hard freeze the first week of May, but that was rare.) As for me, I've planted tomatoes in the ground quite a few years with April 10th as my planting date. Thing about that though is that I plant for market sales and like getting in a very early crop when possible. Also, since I raise hundreds of plants if we ever have a freeze that zaps my early planted tomato plants I can easily replace them with fresh plants from the g-house. (Only twice in the last 15 yrs have I had to replace any though.)

Taking the above into consideration I almost hate to point out a good compromise date...April 15th. TAX day. :>(

Shoe.

horseshoe -
thanks very much. halloween & tax day ... both are scarey!

marsha

HAH! How funny! Never looked at it like that!

I'm gonna hafta to now refer to those days as "Fall and Spring Scary Day".