One of the first steps you take when you are figuring out 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 earliest that you can plant asters in Austin can be figured out by referring to the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Asters

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

Asters do well in moderate cold which tells us that you can plant them a bit earlier in the year than other plants that might not handle the cold.

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

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost when the weather gets warmer is on May 15 in Austin. You can expect an average low temperature of -25°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Austin is not always accurate the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in Austin there is a last frost after May 15 so just be sure to be ready to protect your asters if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Austin

Here is the info for USDA Zone 4b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	May 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	September 15
Lowest Expected Low	-25°F
Highest Expected Low	-20°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -25°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near -20°F.

Plants to Grow in Austin

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