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

The USDA zone info for Ankeny should be looked at to determine when you can plant string beans.

Planting Calendar for String beans

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

String beans are not cold tolerant which tells us that you must wait until it warms up after the last frost has passed before you can plant them.

The earliest that you can plant string beans in Ankeny 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 string beans and expect a good harvest is probably August. If you wait any later than that and your string beans may not have a chance to really do well. Starting your string beans indoors is a great way to get them started a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average all chance of frost has passed is on April 15 in Ankeny. You can expect an average low temperature of -20°F in the coldest months of winter.

Remember that USDA zone info for Ankeny is not always accurate and the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Half of the time in Ankeny last frost occurs after April 15 so make sure that you are prepared to cover your string beans in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Ankeny

Here is the info for USDA Zone 5a.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	October 15
Lowest Expected Low	-20°F
Highest Expected Low	-15°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -20°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near -15°F.

Plants to Grow in Ankeny

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