When to Plant Basil in Streator, IL

One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us estimate your gardening schedule is the USDA zone info. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

The USDA zone info for Streator should be looked at to estimate when it's the best time to plant basil.

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Planting Calendar for Basil

Frost tolerance for basil: Not tolerant of frost.
When to plant: After the last frost has passed.

It's probably not a good idea to plant basil until after the last frost has passed because they are not cold tolerant.

JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Legend 
A good time to plant basil
Possibly ok, but a risky time to plant basil
Probably not a good time to plant basil

The earliest that you can plant basil in Streator is April. However, you really should wait until May if you don't want to take any chances.

The last month that you can plant basil and expect a good harvest is probably August. If you wait any later than that and your basil may not have a chance to fully mature. If you are starting your basil indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost when the weather gets warmer is on April 15 in Streator. You can expect an average low temperature of -15°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Streator is an average the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in Streator you get surprised by a frost after April 15 so make sure that you are ready to cover your basil in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Streator

Here is the info for USDA Zone 5b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)October 15
Lowest Expected Low-15°F
Highest Expected Low-10°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -15°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near -10°F.

Plants to Grow in Streator

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Streator.