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.

You can estimate when to plant melons in El Paso by looking at the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Melons

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

It's probably a bad idea to plant melons until after all chance of frost has passed because they are not cold tolerant.

The earliest that you can plant melons in El Paso 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 melons and expect a good harvest is probably August. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your melons may not have a chance to grow to maturity. You can get started a little bit earlier by starting your melons indoors.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is March 15 in El Paso. It might get as low as 10°F during the coldest months of winter.

It's important to remember that the actual date of last frost may not be accurate from year to year because it is based on the USDA zone info for El Paso and it can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in El Paso you get a frost after March 15 so be sure to be ready to protect your melons in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for El Paso

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 El Paso

You may be interested in your other planting guides for El Paso.