When to Plant Garden cress in Marion, IA

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.

The earliest that you can plant garden cress in Marion should be figured out by using the USDA zone info.


Planting Calendar for Garden cress

Frost tolerance for garden cress: Not tolerant of frost.
When to plant: After all chance of frost has passed.

Since garden cress require warm weather it's necessary to wait until after all chance of frost has passed before you can plant them.

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

The earliest that you can plant garden cress in Marion 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 garden cress and expect a good harvest is probably August. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your garden cress may not have a chance to really do well. You can get started a few weeks earlier by starting your garden cress indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost is on April 15 in Marion. It might get as low as -20°F during the coldest months of winter.

It's important to remember that USDA zone info for Marion is just an average and the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in Marion there is a last frost after April 15 so make sure that you are prepared to cover your garden cress if you have a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Marion

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 Marion

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