One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us determine 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 Madison you can estimate when it's the best time to plant borage by referring to the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Borage

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

Since borage do well in moderate cold you can plant them a little bit earlier in the year than other plants that might not handle the cold.

The earliest that you can plant borage in Madison 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 borage and expect a good harvest is probably September. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your borage may not have a chance to fully mature. Starting your borage indoors is a great way to get them started a little bit earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost is on April 15 in Madison. In the coldest months of winter you should expect an average low temperature of -5°F.

Since the USDA zone info for Madison is an average the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in Madison last frost occurs after April 15 so make sure that you are ready to protect your borage in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Madison

Here is the info for USDA Zone 6b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	October 15
Lowest Expected Low	-5°F
Highest Expected Low	0°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -5°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near 0°F.

Plants to Grow in Madison

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