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.

One way of making a decision about when it's possible to plant chives is to use the USDA zone info for Daphne.

Planting Calendar for Chives

Frost tolerance for chives:	Very tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	Up to 7 weeks before last frost.

Chives do ok in quite a bit of cold which tells us that you can plant them quite a bit earlier in the year than other plants that might not handle the cold.

The earliest that you can plant chives in Daphne 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 chives and expect a good harvest is probably September. If you wait any later than that and your chives may not have a chance to fully mature. If you are starting your chives indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a little bit earlier.

Last Frost Date

In Daphne the average date of last frost happens on March 15. In the coldest months of winter you should expect an average low temperature of 15°F.

It's important to remember that the actual date of last frost is just an average because it is based on the USDA zone info for Daphne and it changes from year to year. Half of the time in Daphne you get surprised by a frost after March 15 so be sure to be ready to cover your chives if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Daphne

Here is the info for USDA Zone 8b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	March 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	November 15
Lowest Expected Low	15°F
Highest Expected Low	20°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 20°F.

Plants to Grow in Daphne

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