One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us estimate your gardening schedule is the USDA zone info. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

A way of estimating when it's the best time to plant pansies is to examine the USDA zone info for Amherst.

Planting Calendar for Pansies

Frost tolerance for pansies:	Very tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	Up to 7 weeks before last frost.

You can plant pansies a lot earlier in the year because they do well in cold.

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

Last Frost Date

In Amherst the average date of last frost happens on April 15. You can expect an average low temperature of -10°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Amherst may not be accurate from year to year the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in Amherst you get surprised by a frost after April 15 so make sure that you are prepared to protect your pansies if you have a late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Amherst

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 Amherst

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