When to Plant Echinacea in Lexington, VA

The USDA Zone info is a great tool for gardeners to help us determine your gardening schedule. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

It's possible to estimate when it's a good idea to plant echinacea by referring to the USDA zone info for Lexington.


Planting Calendar for Echinacea

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

Echinacea are barely cold tolerant which means that you can plant them slightly earlier than other plants that might not handle the cold.

JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Legend 
A good time to plant echinacea
Possibly ok, but a risky time to plant echinacea
Probably not a good time to plant echinacea

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

Last Frost Date

In Lexington the average date of last frost happens on April 15. You can expect an average low temperature of 0°F in the coldest months of winter.

Always keep in mind that the actual date of last frost is an average because it is based on the USDA zone info for Lexington and it can change quite a bit from year to year. Since half of the time in Lexington last frost occurs after April 15 be ready to cover your echinacea if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Lexington

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 Low0°F
Highest Expected Low5°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 Lexington

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