When to Plant Romaine lettuce 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.

The earliest that you can plant romaine lettuce in Evanston should be estimated by looking at the USDA zone info.


Planting Calendar for Romaine lettuce

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

Romaine lettuce do well in cold which means that you can start planting them much earlier than other plants that might not handle the cold.

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

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

Last Frost Date

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

Always keep in mind that the actual date of last frost is not always accurate because it is based on the USDA zone info for Evanston and it can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in Evanston it frosts late in the year after April 15 so always be ready to protect your romaine lettuce if you have one of those late frosts.

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.