Before planting it is a good idea to find your USDA Zone info to estimate your garden schedule. The most important data that the zone info tells us is average last frost and the lowest expected temperature for your area.

The USDA zone info for Aurora should be reffered to in order to figure out when it's possible to plant parsnip.

Planting Calendar for Parsnip

Frost tolerance for parsnip:	Tolerant of some frost.
When to plant:	Up to 5 weeks before last frost.

Since parsnip are one of those plants that can tolerate a little bit of cold weather you can plant them a bit earlier in the year than other plants that might not handle the cold.

The earliest that you can plant parsnip in Aurora 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 parsnip and expect a good harvest is probably September. If you wait any later than that and your parsnip may not have a chance to fully mature. You can get started a couple of weeks earlier by starting your parsnip indoors.

Last Frost Date

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

Since the USDA zone info for Aurora is an average the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Half of the time in Aurora you get a frost after April 15 so make sure that you are ready to cover your parsnip if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Aurora

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 Aurora

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