One of the first steps you take when you are determining your gardening schedule is find your USDA Zone info. The most important data that the zone info tells us is average last frost and the lowest expected temperature for your area.

The USDA zone info for Bessemer City can be looked at to determine when it's a good idea to plant sweet potatos.

Planting Calendar for Sweet Potatos

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

It's probably a bad idea to plant sweet potatos until after all chance of frost has passed because they do not do well in cold weather.

The earliest that you can plant sweet potatos in Bessemer City 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 sweet potatos and expect a good harvest is probably August. If you wait any later than that and your sweet potatos may not have a chance to grow to maturity. You can get started a little bit earlier by starting your sweet potatos indoors.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is April 15 in Bessemer City. It might get as low as 5°F during the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Bessemer City is just an average the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Since half of the time in Bessemer City it frosts late in the year after April 15 be ready to protect your sweet potatos in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Bessemer City

Here is the info for USDA Zone 7b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	October 15
Lowest Expected Low	5°F
Highest Expected Low	10°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is 5°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near 10°F.

Plants to Grow in Bessemer City

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Bessemer City.