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 alyssum is to examine the USDA zone info for Rolling Meadows.

Planting Calendar for Alyssum

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

Alyssum are one of those plants that can tolerate quite a bit of cold weather which tells us that you can get them planted much earlier than other frost tender plants.

The earliest that you can plant alyssum in Rolling Meadows 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 alyssum and expect a good harvest is probably September. Any later than that and your alyssum may not have a chance to grow to maturity. Starting your alyssum indoors is a great way to get them started a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

In Rolling Meadows 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 Rolling Meadows is not always accurate the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Since half of the time in Rolling Meadows last frost occurs after April 15 be ready to protect your alyssum if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Rolling Meadows

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 Rolling Meadows

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Rolling Meadows.