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.

It's a good idea to figure out when you can plant spinach by looking at the USDA zone info for Columbia.

Planting Calendar for Spinach

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

Since spinach are one of those plants that can tolerate a little bit of cold weather you can plant them a bit earlier in the year than other frost tender plants.

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

Last Frost Date

In Columbia the average date of last frost happens on March 15. You can expect an average low temperature of 15°F in the coldest months of winter.

Remember that the actual date of last frost is not always accurate because it is based on the USDA zone info for Columbia and it can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in Columbia it frosts late in the year after March 15 so be sure to be ready to protect your spinach if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Columbia

Here is the info for USDA Zone 8b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	March 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	November 15
Lowest Expected Low	15°F
Highest Expected Low	20°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 20°F.

Plants to Grow in Columbia

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