One of the first steps you take when you are figuring out 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 should be able to estimate when it's a good idea to plant brachycome by looking at the USDA zone info for Metuchen.

Planting Calendar for Brachycome

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

It's a bad idea to plant brachycome until after the last frost has passed because they are not cold tolerant.

The earliest that you can plant brachycome in Metuchen 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 brachycome and expect a good harvest is probably August. If you wait any later than that and your brachycome may not have a chance to really do well. If you are starting your brachycome indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a little bit earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average all chance of frost has passed is on April 15 in Metuchen. You can expect an average low temperature of 0°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Metuchen is just an average the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Half of the time in Metuchen last frost occurs after April 15 so make sure that you are ready to cover your brachycome in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Metuchen

Here is the info for USDA Zone 7a.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	October 15
Lowest Expected Low	0°F
Highest Expected Low	5°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is 0°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near 5°F.

Plants to Grow in Metuchen

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