One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us estimate your gardening schedule is the USDA zone info. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

The USDA zone info for Racine can be reviewed to determine when it's possible to plant verbena.

Planting Calendar for Verbena

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

Since verbena are barely cold tolerant you can plant them just a tiny bit earlier in the year than plants that are more sensitive to the cold.

The earliest that you can plant verbena in Racine 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 verbena and expect a good harvest is probably August. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your verbena may not have a chance to grow to maturity. If you are starting your verbena indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average all chance of frost has passed is on April 15 in Racine. You can expect an average low temperature of -15°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Racine 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 Racine last frost occurs after April 15 so make sure that you are prepared to cover your verbena in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Racine

Here is the info for USDA Zone 5b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	October 15
Lowest Expected Low	-15°F
Highest Expected Low	-10°F

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

Plants to Grow in Racine

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