One of the first steps you take when you are making a decision about 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 first opportunity to plant lemon balm in Red Oak should be estimated by checking out the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Lemon balm

Frost tolerance for lemon balm:	Tolerant of a very small amount of frost.
When to plant:	Up to 3 weeks before last frost.

Since lemon balm do ok in moderate cold you can plant them just a tiny bit earlier in the year than other plants that might not handle the cold.

The earliest that you can plant lemon balm in Red Oak is March. However, you really should wait until April if you don't want to take any chances.

The last month that you can plant lemon balm and expect a good harvest is probably August. Any later than that and your lemon balm may not have a chance to really do well. You can get started a few weeks earlier by starting your lemon balm indoors.

Last Frost Date

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

Since the USDA zone info for Red Oak is an average the actual date of last frost is different every year. Since half of the time in Red Oak it frosts late in the year after April 15 be ready to cover your lemon balm in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Red Oak

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 Red Oak

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Red Oak.