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

In Portsmouth you can estimate when it's the best time to plant banana by looking at the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Banana

Frost tolerance for banana:	Not tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	After the last frost when the weather gets warmer.

Banana are not cold tolerant which means that you must wait until it warms up after all chance of frost has passed before you can plant them.

The earliest that you can plant banana in Portsmouth 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 banana and expect a good harvest is probably August. If you wait any later than that and your banana may not have a chance to fully mature. You can get started a couple of weeks earlier by starting your banana indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost is on April 15 in Portsmouth. You should expect an average low temperature of -10°F in the coldest months of winter.

Just be sure to remember that the actual date of last frost is an average because it is based on the USDA zone info for Portsmouth and it is different every year. Since half of the time in Portsmouth there is a last frost after April 15 be ready to protect your banana in the event of a late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Portsmouth

Here is the info for USDA Zone 6a.

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

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

Plants to Grow in Portsmouth

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