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.

A common way of determining when to plant sweet peas is to refer to the USDA zone info for Altoona.

Planting Calendar for Sweet Peas

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

Sweet Peas do ok in a tiny bit of cold which tells us that you can plant them slightly earlier in the year than more sensitive plants.

The earliest that you can plant sweet peas in Altoona 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 sweet peas and expect a good harvest is probably August. If you wait any later than that and your sweet peas may not have a chance to grow to maturity. You can get started a little bit earlier by starting your sweet peas indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost when the weather gets warmer is on May 15 in Altoona. It might get as low as -25°F during the coldest months of winter.

Keep in mind that USDA zone info for Altoona is just an average and the actual date of last frost is different every year. Since half of the time in Altoona last frost occurs after May 15 be ready to cover your sweet peas in the event of a late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Altoona

Here is the info for USDA Zone 4b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	May 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	September 15
Lowest Expected Low	-25°F
Highest Expected Low	-20°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -25°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near -20°F.

Plants to Grow in Altoona

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