Before planting it is a good idea to find your USDA Zone info to figure out your garden schedule. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

A way of determining when to plant flower-of-an-hour is to look at the USDA zone info for West Des Moines.

Planting Calendar for Flower-of-an-Hour

Frost tolerance for flower-of-an-hour:	Tolerant of a very small amount of frost.
When to plant:	Up to 3 weeks before last frost.

Since flower-of-an-hour are barely cold tolerant you can plant them a bit earlier in the year than other plants that might not handle the cold.

The earliest that you can plant flower-of-an-hour in West Des Moines is March. However, you really should wait until April if you don't want to take any chances.

The last month that you can plant flower-of-an-hour and expect a good harvest is probably August. Any later than that and your flower-of-an-hour may not have a chance to really do well. You can get started a little bit earlier by starting your flower-of-an-hour indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost has passed is on April 15 in West Des Moines. You can expect an average low temperature of -20°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for West Des Moines may not be accurate from year to year the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Half of the time in West Des Moines there is a last frost after April 15 so just be sure to be ready to protect your flower-of-an-hour in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for West Des Moines

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 West Des Moines

You may be interested in your other planting guides for West Des Moines.