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.

You will be able to determine when to plant tomatos by looking at the USDA zone info for Hickory.

Planting Calendar for Tomatos

Frost tolerance for tomatos:	Not tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	After the last frost.

It's a bad idea to plant tomatos until after all chance of frost has passed because they require warm weather.

The earliest that you can plant tomatos in Hickory 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 tomatos and expect a good harvest is probably August. Any later than that and your tomatos may not have a chance to fully mature. You can get started a few weeks earlier by starting your tomatos indoors.

Last Frost Date

In Hickory the average date of last frost happens on April 15. You should expect an average low temperature of 5°F in the coldest months of winter.

Just be sure to remember that USDA zone info for Hickory is just an average and the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Since half of the time in Hickory you get a frost after April 15 be ready to protect your tomatos in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Hickory

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 Hickory

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