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 should be able to figure out when to plant trailing portulaca by checking out the USDA zone info for South Milwaukee.

Planting Calendar for Trailing Portulaca

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

Since trailing portulaca require warm weather you need to wait until after the last frost when the weather gets warmer before you can plant them.

The earliest that you can plant trailing portulaca in South Milwaukee 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 trailing portulaca and expect a good harvest is probably August. Any later than that and your trailing portulaca may not have a chance to grow to maturity. You can get started a few weeks earlier by starting your trailing portulaca indoors.

Last Frost Date

In South Milwaukee the average date of last frost happens on April 15. It might get as low as -15°F during the coldest months of winter.

Always keep in mind that USDA zone info for South Milwaukee is just an average and the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Since half of the time in South Milwaukee last frost occurs after April 15 be ready to protect your trailing portulaca if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for South Milwaukee

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 South Milwaukee

You may be interested in your other planting guides for South Milwaukee.