You can transplant them outside before the last frost. After they are acclimated to outside temperatures, they will tolerate frost and freezing well. The planting date can be hard to determine. I think around April 1st is a good time to plant them outside. Before planting, I would monitor the weather for a week or so to see if the temperatures are fine. If temperatures are in the 50s for highs daily, and lows around 35-40, I would plant them. I would wait if the highs/lows are lower. If you plant them on April 1st, then you want to start the seeds anywhere from 4 to 6 weeks before transplanting, depending on the size of plants you want. That would be around now. Others in your zone may have a better time frame. Better yet, if you give your city and state or general area of the state, others can give an even better estimate since the USDA zones cover a large area with different climates.

Melissa: If you have a variety of broccoli that produces side shoots, you can let it keep going and producing side shoots. Yes, the main head is gone once it's gone. But I definitely get tons more from my side shoots than that initial head. You just want to keep harvesting the side shoots while they're still decently tight and definitely before they flower. I've had broccoli going for a good couple years before. What types of herbs? The thing I noticed about beneficial attracting herbs is that they flower for a short period of time(cilantro, dill, parsley, to name a few). And it's the flowers that attract the beneficial predators. Maybe get some containers to plant some in and keep making successive plantings. What you want is an ever-flowing progress of beneficial attracting flowering plants throughout the year/season. A few that come to mind that tend to keep flowering throughout the summer are marigolds, alyssum, zinnias. There are also some perennials like yarrow, golden marguerite, and tansy and even some perennial alyssums. Borage is also a great herb for this, but watch out--- it can be invasive. Like I said though, you want diversity and staying power for your beneficial plants first and foremost. Usage(herbs) are just a plus. Certain beneficial flowers are good in the spring, summer, and the fall... so, deversify! Corn is a VEGGY that attracts, too. Actually many veggies(from onions, to swiss chard to broccoli )and many more) are great attractors if you let one or two go to flower. You can save the seed at the end of the season Here's a link I find useful for IPM programs. Kevin Here is a link that might be useful: beneficial attarctors and what they attract This post was edited by woohooman on Tue, Feb 18, 14 at 13:13

"I am hopeful by april 20th we will have lettuce to eat." Follow-up april 24th Dinner: Chefs salad with ham from Sunday night and lettuce from my mini greenhouse amazing how some cheapo plastic pipe, plastic dropclothes and some 2 by 4s can make such a difference.

Sorry for the delay. I've moved almost everything outside. I still have a few late started flowers inside but all the veggies have been planted in the garden. I've been pretty busy with my new containers. My neighbor had som pretty large fiberglass containers he used for raising worms. He no longer uses them so I asked and he gave me a couple to make a raised container garden. I've got one planted and am ready to put the other on blocks. It took $50 worth of soil to fill the first one and it's not quite full but that's ok because after I've trimmed the bottom leaves from the tomatoes planted in it I can finish filling it so the plants can make more roots where the bottom leaves were. Back to the subject, it's starting to get hot here so I imagine I will be working more on the inside planters now to stay cool. One problem I have is the window boxes I have are just a little too long for the windows so I've got to buy a shorter one or use smaller containers. I like the window boxes because they have their own tray. I'm guessing the broccoli and cauliflower is out because they take more light but what about cabbage? Anyone ever grown it inside?