Before planting it is a good idea to find your USDA Zone info to determine your garden schedule. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

A common way of making a decision about when to plant watercress is to look at the USDA zone info for Newport.

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 slightly earlier in the year than other plants that might not handle the cold.

The earliest that you can plant watercress in Newport 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. If you wait any later than that and your watercress may not have a chance to really do well. If you are starting your watercress indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is April 15 in Newport. You can expect an average low temperature of 0°F in the coldest months of winter.

Keep in mind that the actual date of last frost is an average because it is based on the USDA zone info for Newport and it is different every year. Since half of the time in Newport you get a frost after April 15 be ready to protect your watercress if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Newport

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 Newport

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