One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us figure out your gardening schedule is the USDA zone info. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

You can determine when it's a good idea to plant monarda in Steger by referring to the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Monarda

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

Monarda do well in a tiny bit of cold which tells us that you can plant them slightly earlier in the year than more sensitive plants.

The earliest that you can plant monarda in Steger 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 monarda and expect a good harvest is probably August. Any later than that and your monarda may not have a chance to grow to maturity. You can get started a couple of weeks earlier by starting your monarda indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost when the weather gets warmer is on April 15 in Steger. It might get as low as -15°F during the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Steger is just an average the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Half of the time in Steger it frosts late in the year after April 15 so be sure to be ready to protect your monarda if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Steger

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 Steger

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