One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us estimate your gardening schedule is the 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 making a decision about when you can plant monarda is to check out the USDA zone info for Gaffney.

Planting Calendar for Monarda

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

Monarda are one of those plants that can tolerate a tiny bit of cold weather which means that you can get them planted just a bit earlier than other plants that might not handle the cold.

The earliest that you can plant monarda in Gaffney 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 monarda and expect a good harvest is probably August. If you wait any later than that and your monarda may not have a chance to grow to maturity. If you are starting your monarda indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a little bit earlier.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is April 15 in Gaffney. It might get as low as 5°F during the coldest months of winter.

Remember that USDA zone info for Gaffney is just an average and the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Half of the time in Gaffney you get surprised by a frost after April 15 so make sure that you are prepared to protect your monarda in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Gaffney

Here is the info for USDA Zone 7b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	October 15
Lowest Expected Low	5°F
Highest Expected Low	10°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is 5°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near 10°F.

Plants to Grow in Gaffney

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