One of the first steps you take when you are determining your gardening schedule is find your 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 Athens can be looked at to determine when you can plant diascia.

Planting Calendar for Diascia

Frost tolerance for diascia:	Tolerant of some frost.
When to plant:	Up to 5 weeks before last frost.

You can plant diascia a bit earlier in the year because they are one of those plants that can tolerate a little bit of cold weather.

The earliest that you can plant diascia in Athens is February. However, you really should wait until March if you don't want to take any chances.

The last month that you can plant diascia and expect a good harvest is probably September. If you wait any later than that and your diascia may not have a chance to fully mature. Starting your diascia indoors is a great way to get them started a little bit earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost has passed is on April 15 in Athens. You should expect an average low temperature of 5°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Athens is not always accurate the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Since half of the time in Athens you get a frost after April 15 be ready to protect your diascia if you have a late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Athens

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 Athens

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