One of the first steps you take when you are determining 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.

The earliest that you can plant sweet potatos in Charleston can be determined by checking out the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Sweet Potatos

Frost tolerance for sweet potatos:	Not tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	After the last frost.

Sweet Potatos are not cold tolerant which means that it's necessary to wait until it warms up after the last frost before you can plant them.

The earliest that you can plant sweet potatos in Charleston 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 potatos and expect a good harvest is probably September. Any later than that and your sweet potatos may not have a chance to fully mature. You can get started a little bit earlier by starting your sweet potatos indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average all chance of frost has passed is on February 15 in Charleston. In the coldest months of winter you should expect an average low temperature of 20°F.

Just be sure to remember that the actual date of last frost is not always accurate because it is based on the USDA zone info for Charleston and it is different every year. Since half of the time in Charleston there is a last frost after February 15 be ready to protect your sweet potatos if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Charleston

Here is the info for USDA Zone 9a.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	February 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	December 15
Lowest Expected Low	20°F
Highest Expected Low	25°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is 20°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near 25°F.

Plants to Grow in Charleston

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