Before planting it is a good idea to find your USDA Zone info to estimate your garden schedule. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

A way of making a decision about when to plant violas is to look at the USDA zone info for Cambridge.

Planting Calendar for Violas

Frost tolerance for violas:	Very tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	Up to 7 weeks before last frost.

You can plant violas earlier in the year because they are very cold tolerant.

The earliest that you can plant violas 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 violas and expect a good harvest is probably August. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your violas may not have a chance to grow to maturity. If you are starting your violas indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is May 15 in Cambridge. You can expect an average low temperature of -30°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Cambridge is just an average the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in Cambridge it frosts late in the year after May 15 so be sure to be ready to cover your violas if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Cambridge

Here is the info for USDA Zone 4a.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	May 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	September 15
Lowest Expected Low	-30°F
Highest Expected Low	-25°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -30°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near -25°F.

Plants to Grow in Cambridge

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