One of the first steps you take when you are determining 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 making a decision about when it's the best time to plant astilbe is to check out the USDA zone info for Park Forest.

Planting Calendar for Astilbe

Frost tolerance for astilbe:	Tolerant of a very small amount of frost.
When to plant:	Up to 3 weeks before last frost.

Astilbe can survive in some cold which means that you can plant them slightly earlier in the year than other plants that might not handle the cold.

The earliest that you can plant astilbe in Park Forest is March. However, you really should wait until April if you don't want to take any chances.

The last month that you can plant astilbe and expect a good harvest is probably August. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your astilbe may not have a chance to grow to maturity. You can get started a few weeks earlier by starting your astilbe indoors.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is April 15 in Park Forest. It might get as low as -15°F during the coldest months of winter.

Just be sure to remember that USDA zone info for Park Forest is not always accurate and the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in Park Forest last frost occurs after April 15 so just be sure to be ready to cover your astilbe in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Park Forest

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 Park Forest

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Park Forest.