One of the first steps you take when you are figuring out 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.

In Salem you can determine when it's possible to plant sweet peas by referring to the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Sweet Peas

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

Sweet Peas do ok in moderate cold which means that you can plant them slightly earlier than more sensitive plants.

The earliest that you can plant sweet peas in Salem 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 sweet peas and expect a good harvest is probably August. Any later than that and your sweet peas may not have a chance to really do well. Starting your sweet peas indoors is a great way to get them started a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost is on March 15 in Salem. You should expect an average low temperature of 15°F in the coldest months of winter.

Remember that USDA zone info for Salem may not be accurate from year to year and the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Half of the time in Salem last frost occurs after March 15 so be sure to be ready to protect your sweet peas if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Salem

Here is the info for USDA Zone 8b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	March 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	November 15
Lowest Expected Low	15°F
Highest Expected Low	20°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 20°F.

Plants to Grow in Salem

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