One of the first steps you take when you are figuring out 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.

One way of getting a good idea when to plant gayfeather is to consult the USDA zone info for Grayslake.

Planting Calendar for Gayfeather

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

Gayfeather do well in cold which means that you can get them planted much earlier than other frost tender plants.

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

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost is on April 15 in Grayslake. You should expect an average low temperature of -15°F in the coldest months of winter.

Keep in mind that the actual date of last frost may not be accurate from year to year because it is based on the USDA zone info for Grayslake and it changes from year to year. Half of the time in Grayslake it frosts late in the year after April 15 so make sure that you are prepared to protect your gayfeather if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Grayslake

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 Grayslake

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