One of the first steps you take when you are making a decision about 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.

A common way of figuring out when you can plant endive is to check out the USDA zone info for Abilene.

Planting Calendar for Endive

Frost tolerance for endive:	Tolerant of some frost.
When to plant:	Up to 5 weeks before last frost.

Endive are one of those plants that can tolerate a little bit of cold weather which tells us that you can plant them earlier than other frost tender plants.

The earliest that you can plant endive in Abilene is February. However, you really should wait until March if you don't want to take any chances.

The last month that you can plant endive and expect a good harvest is probably September. If you wait any later than that and your endive may not have a chance to fully mature. If you are starting your endive 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 March 15 in Abilene. It might get as low as 10°F during the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Abilene may not be accurate from year to year the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Half of the time in Abilene last frost occurs after March 15 so make sure that you are ready to protect your endive if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Abilene

Here is the info for USDA Zone 8a.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	March 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	November 15
Lowest Expected Low	10°F
Highest Expected Low	15°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is 10°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near 15°F.

Plants to Grow in Abilene

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