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.

The first opportunity to plant calibrachoa in Elkhart can be estimated by referring to the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Calibrachoa

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

Calibrachoa do ok in moderate cold which tells us that you can plant them slightly earlier than other frost tender plants.

The earliest that you can plant calibrachoa in Elkhart 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 calibrachoa and expect a good harvest is probably August. If you wait any later than that and your calibrachoa may not have a chance to grow to maturity. Starting your calibrachoa indoors is a great way to get them started a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

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

Keep in mind that the actual date of last frost is just an average because it is based on the USDA zone info for Elkhart and it changes from year to year. Since half of the time in Elkhart it frosts late in the year after April 15 be ready to protect your calibrachoa if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Elkhart

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 Elkhart

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