One of the first steps you take when you are making a decision about 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.

The USDA zone info for East Peoria can be reffered to in order to estimate when you can plant pennisetum.

Planting Calendar for Pennisetum

Frost tolerance for pennisetum:	Tolerant of a very small amount of frost.
When to plant:	Up to 3 weeks before last frost.

Pennisetum do well in mild cold which means that you can plant them slightly earlier in the year than plants that are more sensitive to the cold.

The earliest that you can plant pennisetum in East Peoria is March. However, you really should wait until April if you don't want to take any chances.

The last month that you can plant pennisetum and expect a good harvest is probably August. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your pennisetum may not have a chance to really do well. You can get started a few weeks earlier by starting your pennisetum indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost is on April 15 in East Peoria. It might get as low as -15°F during the coldest months of winter.

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

USDA Zone Info for East Peoria

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 East Peoria

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