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.

The USDA zone info for Taos can be used to estimate when it's the best time to plant nicotiana.

Planting Calendar for Nicotiana

Frost tolerance for nicotiana:	Not tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	After the last frost has passed.

It's probably not a good idea to plant nicotiana until after the last frost because they do not do well in cold weather.

The earliest that you can plant nicotiana in Taos 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 nicotiana and expect a good harvest is probably August. If you wait any later than that and your nicotiana may not have a chance to grow to maturity. If you are starting your nicotiana indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

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

Remember that USDA zone info for Taos is just an average and the actual date of last frost is different every year. Since half of the time in Taos you get a frost after April 15 be ready to protect your nicotiana if you have a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Taos

Here is the info for USDA Zone 5b.

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

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -15°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near -10°F.

Plants to Grow in Taos

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