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 you can plant gherkins is to examine the USDA zone info for Athens.

Planting Calendar for Gherkins

Frost tolerance for gherkins:	Not tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	After the last frost has passed.

It's a bad idea to plant gherkins until after all chance of frost has passed because they do not do well in cold weather.

The earliest that you can plant gherkins in Athens is April. However, you really should wait until May if you don't want to take any chances.

The last month that you can plant gherkins and expect a good harvest is probably August. Any later than that and your gherkins may not have a chance to really do well. If you are starting your gherkins indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost is on April 15 in Athens. You should expect an average low temperature of 0°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Athens is an average the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Half of the time in Athens last frost occurs after April 15 so make sure that you are prepared to cover your gherkins in the event of a late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Athens

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 Athens

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