One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us figure out 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.

A way of making a decision about when it's a good idea to plant sunflowers is to check out the USDA zone info for Milliken.

Planting Calendar for Sunflowers

Frost tolerance for sunflowers:	Not tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	After all chance of frost has passed.

Sunflowers are not cold tolerant which means that it is important to wait until it warms up after the last frost when the weather gets warmer before you can plant them.

The earliest that you can plant sunflowers in Milliken 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 sunflowers and expect a good harvest is probably August. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your sunflowers may not have a chance to grow to maturity. You can get started a little bit earlier by starting your sunflowers indoors.

Last Frost Date

In Milliken the average date of last frost happens on April 15. In the coldest months of winter you can expect an average low temperature of -15°F.

Remember that USDA zone info for Milliken is just an average and the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in Milliken you get surprised by a frost after April 15 so make sure that you are ready to protect your sunflowers if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Milliken

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 Milliken

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