When to Plant Kale in Pompton Lakes, NJ

One of the first steps you take when you are making a decision about 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.

A common way of determining when to plant kale is to refer to the USDA zone info for Pompton Lakes.


Planting Calendar for Kale

Frost tolerance for kale: Tolerant of some frost.
When to plant: Up to 5 weeks before last frost.

Kale do well in some cold which tells us that you can plant them a bit earlier in the year than plants that are more sensitive to the cold.

JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Legend 
A good time to plant kale
Possibly ok, but a risky time to plant kale
Probably not a good time to plant kale

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

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is April 15 in Pompton Lakes. You can expect an average low temperature of 0°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Pompton Lakes is an average the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Half of the time in Pompton Lakes last frost occurs after April 15 so make sure that you are prepared to cover your kale if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Pompton Lakes

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 Low0°F
Highest Expected Low5°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 Pompton Lakes

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Pompton Lakes.