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.

You can determine when it's possible to plant bougainvillea in Storm Lake by looking at the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Bougainvillea

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

It's not a good idea to plant bougainvillea until after the last frost when the weather gets warmer because they require warm weather.

The earliest that you can plant bougainvillea in Storm Lake 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 bougainvillea and expect a good harvest is probably August. If you wait any later than that and your bougainvillea may not have a chance to really do well. If you are starting your bougainvillea indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a little bit earlier.

Last Frost Date

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

Just be sure to remember that the actual date of last frost is just an average because it is based on the USDA zone info for Storm Lake and it changes from year to year. Since half of the time in Storm Lake you get surprised by a frost after April 15 be ready to protect your bougainvillea in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Storm Lake

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 Storm Lake

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Storm Lake.