When to Plant Garlic in Milan, IL

The USDA Zone info is a great tool for gardeners to help us estimate your gardening schedule. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

By checking out the USDA zone info for Milan you will be able to figure out when you can plant garlic.


Planting Calendar for Garlic

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

Garlic do ok in pretty solid cold which means that you can plant them much earlier in the year than plants that are more sensitive to the 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 Milan 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. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your garlic may not have a chance to fully mature. You can get started a couple of weeks earlier by starting your garlic indoors.

Last Frost Date

In Milan the average date of last frost happens on April 15. You should expect an average low temperature of -15°F in the coldest months of winter.

It's important to remember that USDA zone info for Milan is not always accurate and the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Since half of the time in Milan you get a frost after April 15 be ready to protect your garlic in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Milan

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 Milan

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