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.

By referring to the USDA zone info for Fort Payne you will be able to figure out when it's possible to plant cardinal flower.

Planting Calendar for Cardinal Flower

Frost tolerance for cardinal flower:	Not tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	After the last frost.

It's a bad idea to plant cardinal flower until after the last frost because they do not do well in cold weather.

The earliest that you can plant cardinal flower in Fort Payne 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 cardinal flower and expect a good harvest is probably August. If you wait any later than that and your cardinal flower may not have a chance to fully mature. You can get started a few weeks earlier by starting your cardinal flower indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost has passed is on April 15 in Fort Payne. In the coldest months of winter you can expect an average low temperature of 5°F.

Since the USDA zone info for Fort Payne is an average the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Half of the time in Fort Payne it frosts late in the year after April 15 so just be sure to be ready to cover your cardinal flower if you have a late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Fort Payne

Here is the info for USDA Zone 7b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	October 15
Lowest Expected Low	5°F
Highest Expected Low	10°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is 5°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near 10°F.

Plants to Grow in Fort Payne

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Fort Payne.