One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us figure out 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.

One way of determining when it's a good idea to plant arctotis is to examine the USDA zone info for Bourbonnais.

Planting Calendar for Arctotis

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

You can plant arctotis a little bit earlier in the year because they are one of those plants that can tolerate a little bit of cold weather.

The earliest that you can plant arctotis in Bourbonnais 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 arctotis and expect a good harvest is probably September. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your arctotis may not have a chance to fully mature. You can get started a few weeks earlier by starting your arctotis indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost has passed is on April 15 in Bourbonnais. In the coldest months of winter you can expect an average low temperature of -15°F.

Since the USDA zone info for Bourbonnais is not always accurate the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Since half of the time in Bourbonnais it frosts late in the year after April 15 be ready to cover your arctotis in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Bourbonnais

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 Bourbonnais

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