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

The USDA zone info for Carbondale should be reffered to in order to determine when it's a good idea to plant spearmint.

Planting Calendar for Spearmint

Frost tolerance for spearmint:	Very tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	Up to 7 weeks before last frost.

Since spearmint are very cold tolerant you can plant them a lot earlier in the year than other plants that might not handle the cold.

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

Last Frost Date

In Carbondale the average date of last frost happens on April 15. You should expect an average low temperature of -5°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Carbondale may not be accurate from year to year the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in Carbondale last frost occurs after April 15 so make sure that you are prepared to cover your spearmint in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Carbondale

Here is the info for USDA Zone 6b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	October 15
Lowest Expected Low	-5°F
Highest Expected Low	0°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -5°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near 0°F.

Plants to Grow in Carbondale

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