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.

The USDA zone info for Crystal Lake can be reviewed to determine when it's possible to plant dusty miller.

Planting Calendar for Dusty Miller

Frost tolerance for dusty miller:	Very tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	Up to 7 weeks before last frost.

Since dusty miller do well in cold you can plant them quite a bit earlier in the year than other frost tender plants.

The earliest that you can plant dusty miller in Crystal Lake is February. However, you really should wait until March if you don't want to take any chances.

The last month that you can plant dusty miller and expect a good harvest is probably September. Any later than that and your dusty miller may not have a chance to fully mature. You can get started a couple of weeks earlier by starting your dusty miller indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost is on April 15 in Crystal Lake. You can expect an average low temperature of -15°F in the coldest months of winter.

Remember that USDA zone info for Crystal Lake is just an average and the actual date of last frost is different every year. Half of the time in Crystal Lake there is a last frost after April 15 so always be ready to protect your dusty miller if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Crystal Lake

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 Crystal Lake

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