One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us determine 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 should be able to figure out when it's possible to plant watermelon by referring to the USDA zone info for Oak Park.

Planting Calendar for Watermelon

Frost tolerance for watermelon:	Not tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	After all chance of frost has passed.

You can not plant watermelon until after the last frost because they are not cold tolerant.

The earliest that you can plant watermelon in Oak Park is April. However, you really should wait until May if you don't want to take any chances.

The last month that you can plant watermelon and expect a good harvest is probably August. Any later than that and your watermelon may not have a chance to grow to maturity. You can get started a little bit earlier by starting your watermelon indoors.

Last Frost Date

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

Since the USDA zone info for Oak Park is just an average the actual date of last frost is different every year. Since half of the time in Oak Park there is a last frost after April 15 be ready to protect your watermelon in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Oak Park

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 Oak Park

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Oak Park.