When to Plant Cardinal Flower in Perry, IA

The USDA Zone info is a great tool for gardeners to help us figure out your gardening schedule. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

One way of estimating when it's a good idea to plant cardinal flower is to examine the USDA zone info for Perry.


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 when the weather gets warmer because they require warm weather.

JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Legend 
A good time to plant cardinal flower
Possibly ok, but a risky time to plant cardinal flower
Probably not a good time to plant cardinal flower

The earliest that you can plant cardinal flower in Perry 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

In Perry the average date of last frost happens on April 15. You can expect an average low temperature of -20°F in the coldest months of winter.

It's important to remember that USDA zone info for Perry is not always accurate and the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Since half of the time in Perry it frosts late in the year after April 15 be ready to cover your cardinal flower in the event of a late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Perry

Here is the info for USDA Zone 5a.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)October 15
Lowest Expected Low-20°F
Highest Expected Low-15°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -20°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near -15°F.

Plants to Grow in Perry

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