One of the first steps you take when you are figuring out your gardening schedule is find your 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 Pella should be used to figure out when you can plant garden cress.

Planting Calendar for Garden cress

Frost tolerance for garden cress:	Not tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	After the last frost when the weather gets warmer.

You can not plant garden cress until after the last frost has passed because they do not do well in cold weather.

The earliest that you can plant garden cress in Pella 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. If you wait any later than that and your garden cress may not have a chance to really do well. You can get started a little bit earlier by starting your garden cress indoors.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is April 15 in Pella. You can expect an average low temperature of -15°F in the coldest months of winter.

Just be sure to remember that the actual date of last frost is an average because it is based on the USDA zone info for Pella and it will vary from year to year. Half of the time in Pella it frosts late in the year after April 15 so just be sure to be ready to cover your garden cress in the event of a late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Pella

Here is the info for USDA Zone 5b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	October 15
Lowest Expected Low	-15°F
Highest Expected Low	-10°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 -10°F.

Plants to Grow in Pella

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