The USDA Zone info is a great tool for gardeners to help us determine your gardening schedule. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

One way of making a decision about when it's a good idea to plant sweet peas is to look at the USDA zone info for Laurel.

Planting Calendar for Sweet Peas

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

Sweet Peas do well in mild cold which means that you can plant them slightly earlier in the year than other plants that might not handle the cold.

The earliest that you can plant sweet peas in Laurel 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 sweet peas and expect a good harvest is probably August. If you wait any later than that and your sweet peas may not have a chance to fully mature. If you are starting your sweet peas indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a few weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average all chance of frost has passed is on May 15 in Laurel. It might get as low as -25°F during the coldest months of winter.

It's important to remember that USDA zone info for Laurel is an average and the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in Laurel it frosts late in the year after May 15 so just be sure to be ready to cover your sweet peas in the event of a late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Laurel

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 Laurel

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