When to Plant Garlic in Hillsboro, IL

One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us estimate 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.

You will be able to determine when to plant garlic by looking at the USDA zone info for Hillsboro.


Planting Calendar for Garlic

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

You can plant garlic a lot earlier in the year because they do well in cold.

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

The earliest that you can plant garlic in Hillsboro 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 garlic and expect a good harvest is probably September. If you wait any later than that and your garlic may not have a chance to really do well. You can get started a few weeks earlier by starting your garlic indoors.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is April 15 in Hillsboro. In the coldest months of winter you can expect an average low temperature of -10°F.

Since the USDA zone info for Hillsboro is just an average the actual date of last frost is different every year. Since half of the time in Hillsboro there is a last frost after April 15 be ready to cover your garlic in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Hillsboro

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 Hillsboro

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