One of the first steps you take when you are estimating 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.

A common way of determining when you can plant chinese chives is to use the USDA zone info for Lisle.

Planting Calendar for Chinese chives

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

You can plant chinese chives a bit earlier in the year because they do well in moderate cold.

The earliest that you can plant chinese chives in Lisle 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 chinese chives and expect a good harvest is probably September. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your chinese chives may not have a chance to fully mature. If you are starting your chinese chives indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a few weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

In Lisle the average date of last frost happens on April 15. It might get as low as -15°F during the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Lisle is just an average the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Since half of the time in Lisle it frosts late in the year after April 15 be ready to protect your chinese chives in the event of a late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Lisle

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 Lisle

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