When to Plant Garlic in Watseka, IL

The USDA Zone info is a great tool for gardeners to help us estimate your gardening schedule. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

You can determine when you can plant garlic in Watseka by referring to the USDA zone info.


Planting Calendar for Garlic

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

Garlic are very cold tolerant which tells us that you can get them planted much earlier than other frost tender plants.

JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Legend 
A good time to plant garlic
Possibly ok, but a risky time to plant garlic
Probably not a good time to plant garlic

The earliest that you can plant garlic in Watseka 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 garlic and expect a good harvest is probably September. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your garlic may not have a chance to fully mature. You can get started a couple of weeks earlier by starting your garlic indoors.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is April 15 in Watseka. In the coldest months of winter you should expect an average low temperature of -15°F.

Since the USDA zone info for Watseka is an average the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in Watseka it frosts late in the year after April 15 so make sure that you are ready to protect your garlic in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Watseka

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 Watseka

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