When to Plant Flax in Evanston, IL

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.

In Evanston you can determine when it's the best time to plant flax by checking out the USDA zone info.


Planting Calendar for Flax

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

Flax are moderately cold tolerant which means that you can plant them a little bit earlier than other plants that might not handle the cold.

JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Legend 
A good time to plant flax
Possibly ok, but a risky time to plant flax
Probably not a good time to plant flax

The earliest that you can plant flax in Evanston 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 flax and expect a good harvest is probably September. If you wait any later than that and your flax may not have a chance to grow to maturity. If you are starting your flax indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a little bit earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average all chance of frost has passed is on April 15 in Evanston. In the coldest months of winter you should expect an average low temperature of -15°F.

Keep in mind that USDA zone info for Evanston is just an average and the actual date of last frost is different every year. Half of the time in Evanston it frosts late in the year after April 15 so make sure that you are ready to cover your flax if you have a late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Evanston

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 Evanston

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