Before planting it is a good idea to find your USDA Zone info to determine your garden schedule. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

You should be able to figure out when it's a good idea to plant echinacea by referring to the USDA zone info for Park Forest.

Planting Calendar for Echinacea

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

Echinacea are barely cold tolerant which means that you can get them planted just a bit earlier than other plants that might not handle the cold.

The earliest that you can plant echinacea 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 echinacea and expect a good harvest is probably August. If you wait any later than that and your echinacea may not have a chance to fully mature. If you are starting your echinacea indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a little bit earlier.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is April 15 in Park Forest. You should expect an average low temperature of -15°F in the coldest months of winter.

Keep in mind that the actual date of last frost may not be accurate from year to year because it is based on the USDA zone info for Park Forest and it changes from year to year. Since half of the time in Park Forest you get surprised by a frost after April 15 be ready to cover your echinacea if you have 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.