One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us estimate your gardening schedule is the USDA zone info. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

The USDA zone info for New Lenox should be reffered to in order to figure out when to plant garden mums.

Planting Calendar for Garden Mums

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

Garden Mums do well in mild cold which tells us that you can plant them a little earlier in the year than other plants that might not handle the cold.

The earliest that you can plant garden mums in New Lenox is February. However, you really should wait until March if you don't want to take any chances.

The last month that you can plant garden mums and expect a good harvest is probably September. If you wait any later than that and your garden mums may not have a chance to grow to maturity. If you are starting your garden mums indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a little bit earlier.

Last Frost Date

In New Lenox the average date of last frost happens on April 15. You can expect an average low temperature of -15°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for New Lenox is an average the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in New Lenox it frosts late in the year after April 15 so make sure that you are prepared to cover your garden mums if you have a late frost.

USDA Zone Info for New Lenox

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 New Lenox

You may be interested in your other planting guides for New Lenox.