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.

The USDA zone info for Durham should be reffered to in order to determine when you can plant rock cress.

Planting Calendar for Rock Cress

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

Since rock cress are one of those plants that can tolerate quite a bit of cold weather you can plant them earlier in the year than more sensitive plants.

The earliest that you can plant rock cress in Durham 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 rock cress and expect a good harvest is probably September. If you wait any later than that and your rock cress may not have a chance to grow to maturity. You can get started a few weeks earlier by starting your rock cress indoors.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is April 15 in Durham. In the coldest months of winter you can expect an average low temperature of 5°F.

Always keep in mind that USDA zone info for Durham is not always accurate and the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Since half of the time in Durham there is a last frost after April 15 be ready to protect your rock cress in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Durham

Here is the info for USDA Zone 7b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	October 15
Lowest Expected Low	5°F
Highest Expected Low	10°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is 5°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near 10°F.

Plants to Grow in Durham

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