One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us figure out your gardening schedule is the USDA zone info. The most important data that the zone info tells us is average last frost and the lowest expected temperature for your area.

A common way of figuring out when it's possible to plant echinacea is to refer to the USDA zone info for Jackson.

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 get them planted just a bit earlier than plants that are more sensitive to the cold.

The earliest that you can plant echinacea in Jackson 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 echinacea and expect a good harvest is probably August. Any later than that and your echinacea may not have a chance to really do well. If you are starting your echinacea indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a little bit earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average all chance of frost has passed is on May 15 in Jackson. You can expect an average low temperature of -25°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Jackson may not be accurate from year to year the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in Jackson last frost occurs after May 15 so always be ready to cover your echinacea if you have a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Jackson

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 Jackson

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