One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us determine 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.

A common way of making a decision about when to plant echinacea is to examine the USDA zone info for Peoria.

Planting Calendar for Echinacea

Frost tolerance for echinacea:	Tolerant of a very small amount of frost.
When to plant:	Up to 3 weeks before last frost.

Echinacea tend to make it in a tiny bit of cold which means that you can plant them a bit earlier in the year than other frost tender plants.

The earliest that you can plant echinacea in Peoria 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 echinacea and expect a good harvest is probably September. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your echinacea may not have a chance to grow to maturity. Starting your echinacea indoors is a great way to get them started a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

In Peoria the average date of last frost happens on February 15. You can expect an average low temperature of 25°F in the coldest months of winter.

Always keep in mind that USDA zone info for Peoria is not always accurate and the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in Peoria last frost occurs after February 15 so always be ready to cover your echinacea in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Peoria

Here is the info for USDA Zone 9b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	February 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	December 15
Lowest Expected Low	25°F
Highest Expected Low	30°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is 25°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near 30°F.

Plants to Grow in Peoria

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