One of the first steps you take when you are making a decision about 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.

By using the USDA zone info for Salem you should be able to estimate when it's a good idea to plant celery.

Planting Calendar for Celery

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

Celery do ok in moderate cold which tells us that you can start planting them slightly earlier than other plants that might not handle the cold.

The earliest that you can plant celery in Salem 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 celery and expect a good harvest is probably August. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your celery may not have a chance to fully mature. If you are starting your celery indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a few weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average all chance of frost has passed is on April 15 in Salem. It might get as low as -10°F during the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Salem 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 Salem you get a frost after April 15 be ready to protect your celery in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Salem

Here is the info for USDA Zone 6a.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	October 15
Lowest Expected Low	-10°F
Highest Expected Low	-5°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -10°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near -5°F.

Plants to Grow in Salem

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