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.

In Cambridge you can figure out when you can plant monarda by looking at 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 ok in moderate cold which tells us that you can plant them slightly earlier than other plants that might not handle the cold.

The earliest that you can plant monarda in Cambridge 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 really do well. If you are starting your monarda indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a little bit earlier.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is April 15 in Cambridge. You can expect an average low temperature of 5°F in the coldest months of winter.

It's important to remember that USDA zone info for Cambridge may not be accurate from year to year and the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Since half of the time in Cambridge you get a frost after April 15 be ready to protect your monarda in the event of a late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Cambridge

Here is the info for USDA Zone 7b.

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

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

Plants to Grow in Cambridge

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