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.

It's possible to estimate when to plant borage by checking out the USDA zone info for Rice Lake.

Planting Calendar for Borage

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

Since borage are moderately cold tolerant you can plant them a bit earlier in the year than plants that are more sensitive to the cold.

The earliest that you can plant borage in Rice Lake 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 borage and expect a good harvest is probably August. If you wait any later than that and your borage may not have a chance to fully mature. You can get started a little bit earlier by starting your borage indoors.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is May 15 in Rice Lake. In the coldest months of winter you can expect an average low temperature of -30°F.

Since the USDA zone info for Rice Lake is not always accurate the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in Rice Lake you get surprised by a frost after May 15 so make sure that you are prepared to protect your borage in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Rice Lake

Here is the info for USDA Zone 4a.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	May 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	September 15
Lowest Expected Low	-30°F
Highest Expected Low	-25°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -30°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near -25°F.

Plants to Grow in Rice Lake

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Rice Lake.