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.

One way of determining when it's a good idea to plant black pepper is to look at the USDA zone info for Signal Mountain.

Planting Calendar for Black pepper

Frost tolerance for black pepper:	Not tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	After the last frost.

Black pepper are not cold tolerant which tells us that you really should wait until it warms up after the last frost before you can plant them.

The earliest that you can plant black pepper in Signal Mountain 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 black pepper and expect a good harvest is probably August. Any later than that and your black pepper may not have a chance to fully mature. If you are starting your black pepper 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 Signal Mountain. You should expect an average low temperature of 0°F in the coldest months of winter.

It's important to remember that the actual date of last frost is an average because it is based on the USDA zone info for Signal Mountain and it will vary from year to year. Half of the time in Signal Mountain there is a last frost after April 15 so make sure that you are prepared to protect your black pepper if you have a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Signal Mountain

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 Signal Mountain

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Signal Mountain.