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

One way of estimating when it's a good idea to plant watercress is to examine the USDA zone info for Bowling Green.

Planting Calendar for Watercress

Frost tolerance for watercress:	Tolerant of a very small amount of frost.
When to plant:	Up to 3 weeks before last frost.

Watercress do well in very little cold which means that you can plant them just a tiny bit earlier in the year than plants that are more sensitive to the cold.

The earliest that you can plant watercress in Bowling Green 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 watercress and expect a good harvest is probably August. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your watercress may not have a chance to grow to maturity. You can get started a little bit earlier by starting your watercress indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost has passed is on April 15 in Bowling Green. In the coldest months of winter you should expect an average low temperature of -15°F.

Remember that the actual date of last frost is just an average because it is based on the USDA zone info for Bowling Green and it changes from year to year. Since half of the time in Bowling Green there is a last frost after April 15 be ready to cover your watercress in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Bowling Green

Here is the info for USDA Zone 5b.

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

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -15°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near -10°F.

Plants to Grow in Bowling Green

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Bowling Green.