One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us estimate 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 determining when it's a good idea to plant napa cabbage is to use the USDA zone info for Cedar Falls.

Planting Calendar for Napa cabbage

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

Napa cabbage tend to make it in pretty solid cold which tells us that you can plant them much earlier in the year than other plants that might not handle the cold.

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

Last Frost Date

In Cedar Falls the average date of last frost happens on April 15. In the coldest months of winter you can expect an average low temperature of -20°F.

Since the USDA zone info for Cedar Falls is just an average the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Since half of the time in Cedar Falls there is a last frost after April 15 be ready to cover your napa cabbage in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Cedar Falls

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 Cedar Falls

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Cedar Falls.