When to Plant Chives in Lake City, FL

Before planting it is a good idea to find your USDA Zone info to figure out your garden schedule. 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 Lake City should be reffered to in order to figure out when it's a good idea to plant chives.


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 pretty solid cold which tells us that you can plant them quite a bit earlier in the year than more sensitive plants.

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

The earliest that you can plant chives in Lake City 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. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else 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 couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is March 15 in Lake City. You should expect an average low temperature of 15°F in the coldest months of winter.

Remember that the actual date of last frost is an average because it is based on the USDA zone info for Lake City and it can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in Lake City it frosts late in the year after March 15 so make sure that you are prepared to cover your chives if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Lake City

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 Low15°F
Highest Expected Low20°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 Lake City

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