Frost dates
Frost in the East Midlands
What the stations recorded, 1996 to 2025
- Sutton Bonington (48 m): 3.4 air frost days on average in April and 0.8 in May; 0.7 in October and 4.3 in November. May is the last spring month averaging half a frosty day or more, and October the first autumn one. About 41 frosty days a year.
- Waddington (68 m): 1.3 air frost days on average in April and 0.1 in May; 0.2 in October and 2.5 in November. April is the last spring month averaging half a frosty day or more, and November the first autumn one. About 33 frosty days a year.
Sutton Bonington, on the Nottinghamshire and Leicestershire border at 48 m, is one of the frostier lowland stations in England. Waddington, near Lincoln, gives the Lincolnshire picture.
Your own garden
A station is one spot. Add your postcode for your area's average last and first frost.
Month by month
| Station | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sutton Bonington | 9.5 | 8.0 | 5.9 | 3.4 | 0.8 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0.7 | 4.3 | 8.0 |
| Waddington | 9.2 | 7.7 | 4.4 | 1.3 | 0.1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0.2 | 2.5 | 7.4 |
What this means for sowing and planting
Sutton Bonington averages close to a frosty day in May and several in April, much like Durham despite being far further south. Waddington, near Lincoln and a little higher at 68 m, averages far fewer April frosts.
For tender crops around Nottingham and Leicester that means late May at the earliest and June to be safe. Potatoes planted in April may need their shoots covered.
Local things that change it
Low ground can be colder
On still, clear nights cold air can settle in low ground, so valley gardens may be frostier than the table suggests.Autumn comes early
Sutton Bonington averages close to one frosty day in October. Late sowings have less time than the calendar suggests.Northamptonshire and Derbyshire
Neither has a station in this dataset. The Peak District is far higher and colder.Your garden
Use the postcode look-up above for your own area.
What we can and can't tell you
Stations, not your garden
These are thermometer readings at a handful of Met Office sites, averaged over thirty years. They show how the region behaves, not what your garden will do this spring. A frosty day count isn't a last-frost date, and a ground frost can come on a night the station records none. For your area's typical last frost and how late one can come, use the postcode look-up above.
Keep going
Where this comes from
Crop windows, growing times and plant families come from Vercro's own curated crop catalogue, the same data the Vercro app uses. Where a published source says something different, we show both rather than choosing the convenient one. Reviewed 19 September 2026.
- Historic station data (monthly air frost days, 1996 to 2025), Met Office, Open Government Licence v3.0. Read 19 September 2026.
- A touch of frost: types of frost, Royal Meteorological Society. Read 19 September 2026.
Vercro reads your garden's own frost dates
Add your garden's postcode and Vercro uses its frost dates to say whether a sowing will finish in time, and its forecast to shape the jobs it shows on Today.