One of the first steps you take when you are getting a good idea 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.

A common way of determining when you can plant borage is to refer to the USDA zone info for Bellwood.

Planting Calendar for Borage

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

Since borage are moderately cold tolerant you can plant them a little earlier in the year than more sensitive plants.

The earliest that you can plant borage in Bellwood 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 borage and expect a good harvest is probably September. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your borage may not have a chance to really do well. If you are starting your borage indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost when the weather gets warmer is on April 15 in Bellwood. You should expect an average low temperature of -15°F in the coldest months of winter.

It's important to remember that USDA zone info for Bellwood is just an average and the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Half of the time in Bellwood you get surprised by a frost after April 15 so be sure to be ready to protect your borage in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Bellwood

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 Bellwood

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