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.

In East Alton you can estimate when it's possible to plant peas by checking out the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Peas

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

Since peas do well in cold you can plant them quite a bit earlier in the year than plants that are more sensitive to the cold.

The earliest that you can plant peas in East Alton 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 peas and expect a good harvest is probably September. Any later than that and your peas may not have a chance to fully mature. You can get started a few weeks earlier by starting your peas indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average all chance of frost has passed is on April 15 in East Alton. You can expect an average low temperature of -10°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for East Alton is not always accurate the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in East Alton you get a frost after April 15 so make sure that you are ready to protect your peas if you have a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for East Alton

Here is the info for USDA Zone 6a.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	October 15
Lowest Expected Low	-10°F
Highest Expected Low	-5°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -10°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near -5°F.

Plants to Grow in East Alton

You may be interested in your other planting guides for East Alton.