Before planting it is a good idea to find your USDA Zone info to figure out 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 Darby should be reffered to in order to figure out when it's the best time to plant watercress.

Planting Calendar for Watercress

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

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

The earliest that you can plant watercress in Darby 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 watercress and expect a good harvest is probably August. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your watercress may not have a chance to fully mature. You can get started a little bit earlier by starting your watercress indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost when the weather gets warmer is on April 15 in Darby. In the coldest months of winter you should expect an average low temperature of 0°F.

It's important to remember that USDA zone info for Darby 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 Darby it frosts late in the year after April 15 so make sure that you are ready to protect your watercress if you have a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Darby

Here is the info for USDA Zone 7a.

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

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

Plants to Grow in Darby

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