December Planting Guide by Zone
Click on your Zone for details.
Zones 1 – 4
- Review your notes from this season and start planning next year’s garden. Think about which crops did well and which didn’t so you can decide if different varieties are needed next time. Think about the amount of each crop and whether it was enough or too much. Take stock of lessons learned before ordering seeds for next year.
- Inventory your leftover seeds and compare them with what you need for next season.
- Browse our website, make a Wishlist, and order early to avoid disappointment.
- Continue harvesting greens from the hoop house or coldframe.
- Try growing salad greens or herbs in pots inside. If you need help, Indoor Herbs – Better Than Houseplants walks you through what you need to know to get started and be successful. A south-facing window helps, but it isn’t essential. If you are a beginner at growing inside, start with sprouts and enjoy crisp greens in a week.
- Spend some time reading a new gardening book or researching an aspect of gardening you’ve wanted to learn more about.
- Remember, gardening is for everyone when making out your holiday gift list!
Zones 5 – 6
- Review your notes from this season and start planning next year’s garden. Think about which crops did well and which didn’t so you can decide if different varieties are needed next time. Think about the amount of each crop and whether it was enough or too much. Take stock of lessons learned before ordering seeds for next year
- Cover overwintering crops with 8 inches of straw, and then top with a row cover.
- As weather permits, continue to harvest leeks, spinach, kale, carrots, and other late fall crops. Keep straw snuggled around any crops still in the garden for extra protection
- If you are using a coldframe to grow greens through winter, consider rigging a plastic tunnel over the frame for extra warmth
- Cut back asparagus fronds
- In areas with a wet winter, cover your compost pile to prevent rains and snows from leaching out nutrients
- Make unique, signature holiday wreaths from grapevines, visually interesting plant stalks, greens, and dry seedpods
- Protect your perennials with a layer of winter mulch after the first few freezes.
- Clean up garden debris to eliminate overwintering areas for diseases and insect pests.
- Try growing salad greens or herbs in pots inside. If you need help, Indoor Herbs – Better Than Houseplants walks you through what you need to know to get started and be successful. A south-facing window helps, but it isn’t essential. If you are a beginner at growing inside, start with sprouts and enjoy crisp greens in a week.
- Browse our website, make a Wishlist, and order early to avoid disappointment.
- Spend some time reading a new gardening book or researching an aspect of gardening you’ve wanted to learn more about.
- Remember, gardening is for everyone when making out your holiday gift list!
Zones 7 – 8
- Review your notes from this season and start planning next year’s garden. Think about which crops did well and which didn’t so you can decide if different varieties are needed next time. Think about the amount of each crop and whether it was enough or too much. Take stock of lessons learned before ordering seeds for next year.
- Remember to gather leaves for mulching, composting, or digging into the soil before they blow away or snow covers them up.
- Feed your winter flowers when the weather is mild.
- Cover strawberries with a thick cover of straw mulch—they’ll fare better over winter and bear earlier next spring. Remove just after the last frost next season.
- If you add a second layer of row cover protection for leafy vegetables like spinach, lettuce, and collards, they’ll continue producing longer. Remove the covers during the day and replace them around sunset.
- Fill a few plastic jugs with water and place them between still-growing rows to add a half to a full month to the growing season; they collect heat during the day and radiate it back at night.
- If you have a coldframe, continue planting chives, spinach, mustard, peas, beets, lettuce, and radishes.
- Clean up garden debris to eliminate overwintering areas for diseases and insect pests.
- On warm days, start getting beds ready for spring by adding lots of compost. Six inches isn’t too much as it will settle and be incorporated into the soil by earthworms and other soil organisms.
- Try growing salad greens or herbs in pots inside. If you need help, Indoor Herbs – Better Than Houseplants walks you through what you need to know to get started and be successful. A south-facing window helps, but it isn’t essential. If you are a beginner at growing inside, start with sprouts and enjoy crisp greens in a week.
- Browse our website, make a Wishlist, and order early to avoid disappointment. Pay special attention to cool-season, early-planting vegetables like lettuce, cabbage, spinach, and peas.
- Spend some time reading a new gardening book or researching an aspect of gardening you’ve wanted to learn more about.
- Now is the perfect time to plan and design any garden upgrades you want to do next season.
- Remember, gardening is for everyone when making out your holiday gift list!
Zones 9 – 10
- Review your notes from this season and start planning next year’s garden. Think about which crops did well and which didn’t so you can decide if different varieties are needed next time. Think about the amount of each crop and whether it was enough or too much. Take stock of lessons learned before ordering seeds for next year.
- Sow a winter cover crop next season for greatly improved soil. Single varieties of cereal rye, oats, or buckwheat work well, but a mix incorporating legumes to fix nitrogen and grasses to till the soil works better.
- In some southern areas, you can still start cold-tolerant vegetables like beets, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, carrots, peas, cabbage, spinach, and lettuce. You’ll get an early harvest before the heat arrives late next spring.
- The same holds true for cool-season herbs like parsley, thyme, sage, dill, fennel, and cilantro.
- Even though you are in the longest growing season, watch the weather forecast. If frost is predicted, be prepared to protect your garden with row covers.
- Browse our website, make a Wishlist, and order early to avoid disappointment. Pay special attention to cool-season, early-planting vegetables like lettuce, cabbage, spinach, and peas.
- Keep harvesting the garden to continue production and remove any dead plants and fruits to prevent disease and insects from moving in.
- Remember, gardening is for everyone when making out your holiday gift list!
Zone Planting Guides
Planting charts for your Zone
Zone 3
Zone 3 is the coldest and shortest of the USDA garden zones.
Zone 4
Zone 5
Zone 6
Zone 7
Zone 8
Zone 9
Zone 10
USDA Zones vs First & Last Frost Dates
Which to Use and Why
USDA Zone Maps
These guides show the lowest average temperatures recorded in the area over the past 30 years.
They are a good basis for initial planning and comparison but should not be used as the only source of information for choosing what vegetables to grow or when to plant.
The Zone information is helpful when exchanging ideas with gardeners in different zones, as it is user-friendly.
Find your USDA hardiness zone here.
Scroll using your cursor to grab and move the map, then zoom in with the + and – buttons at the top left. Once you can see your town, city, or location, click on the map to see your Zone info in a popup window.
First & Last Frost Dates Tool
This frost dates tool provides detailed and accurate information for sowing seed, transplanting, and using frost protection to extend the growing season.
It includes historical data from numerous regional NOAA weather stations to help determine the likelihood of frost in spring and fall.
Find your First and Last frost dates here.
Enter your ZIP code and scroll down to see general information and the three closest weather stations to you.