Before planting it is a good idea to find your USDA Zone info to estimate your garden schedule. 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 Akron should be reffered to in order to estimate when to plant echinacea.

Planting Calendar for Echinacea

Frost tolerance for echinacea:	Tolerant of a very small amount of frost.
When to plant:	Up to 3 weeks before last frost.

Echinacea are barely cold tolerant which means that you can plant them slightly earlier than more sensitive plants.

The earliest that you can plant echinacea in Akron is March. However, you really should wait until April if you don't want to take any chances.

The last month that you can plant echinacea and expect a good harvest is probably August. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your echinacea may not have a chance to grow to maturity. Starting your echinacea indoors is a great way to get them started a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost is on April 15 in Akron. You should expect an average low temperature of -5°F in the coldest months of winter.

Always keep in mind that the actual date of last frost is just an average because it is based on the USDA zone info for Akron and it changes from year to year. Half of the time in Akron last frost occurs after April 15 so make sure that you are prepared to cover your echinacea in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Akron

Here is the info for USDA Zone 6b.

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

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

Plants to Grow in Akron

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