When to Plant Carrots in Gardiner, ME

One of the first steps you take when you are estimating 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.

By checking out the USDA zone info for Gardiner it's possible to estimate when to plant carrots.


Planting Calendar for Carrots

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

Carrots do well in moderate cold which means that you can plant them a little bit earlier than other plants that might not handle the cold.

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

The earliest that you can plant carrots in Gardiner 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 carrots and expect a good harvest is probably September. If you wait any later than that and your carrots may not have a chance to grow to maturity. If you are starting your carrots indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a few weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost has passed is on April 15 in Gardiner. It might get as low as -20°F during the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Gardiner is just an average the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Since half of the time in Gardiner it frosts late in the year after April 15 be ready to protect your carrots in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Gardiner

Here is the info for USDA Zone 5a.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)October 15
Lowest Expected Low-20°F
Highest Expected Low-15°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -20°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near -15°F.

Plants to Grow in Gardiner

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