Before planting it is a good idea to find your USDA Zone info to figure out your garden schedule. 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 possible to plant roses is to look at the USDA zone info for South Elgin.

Planting Calendar for Roses

Frost tolerance for roses:	Tolerant of some frost.
When to plant:	Up to 5 weeks before last frost.

Roses are moderately cold tolerant which tells us that you can get them planted earlier than more sensitive plants.

The earliest that you can plant roses in South Elgin 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 roses and expect a good harvest is probably September. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your roses may not have a chance to fully mature. Starting your roses indoors is a great way to get them started a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost is on April 15 in South Elgin. You can expect an average low temperature of -15°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for South Elgin is not always accurate the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Since half of the time in South Elgin you get surprised by a frost after April 15 be ready to cover your roses in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for South Elgin

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 South Elgin

You may be interested in your other planting guides for South Elgin.