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 way of figuring out when it's the best time to plant lobelia is to use the USDA zone info for New Philadelphia.

Planting Calendar for Lobelia

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

Since lobelia are one of those plants that can tolerate quite a bit of cold weather you can plant them earlier in the year than plants that are more sensitive to the cold.

The earliest that you can plant lobelia in New Philadelphia 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 lobelia and expect a good harvest is probably September. If you wait any later than that and your lobelia may not have a chance to really do well. You can get started a couple of weeks earlier by starting your lobelia indoors.

Last Frost Date

In New Philadelphia the average date of last frost happens on April 15. In the coldest months of winter you should expect an average low temperature of -10°F.

Since the USDA zone info for New Philadelphia is just an average the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Half of the time in New Philadelphia last frost occurs after April 15 so be sure to be ready to protect your lobelia if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for New Philadelphia

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 New Philadelphia

You may be interested in your other planting guides for New Philadelphia.