Before planting it is a good idea to find your USDA Zone info to figure out your garden schedule. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

In Raton you can figure out when it's possible to plant melons by looking at the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Melons

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

Melons are not cold tolerant which tells us that you need to wait until it warms up after the last frost before you can plant them.

The earliest that you can plant melons in Raton 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 melons and expect a good harvest is probably August. If you wait any later than that and your melons may not have a chance to really do well. You can get started a little bit earlier by starting your melons indoors.

Last Frost Date

In Raton the average date of last frost happens on April 15. It might get as low as -10°F during the coldest months of winter.

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

USDA Zone Info for Raton

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 Raton

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