When to Plant Centaurea in Forest Park, IL

One of the first steps you take when you are estimating your gardening schedule is find your USDA Zone info. The most important data that the zone info tells us is average last frost and the lowest expected temperature for your area.

It's a good idea to figure out when it's the best time to plant centaurea by looking at the USDA zone info for Forest Park.


Planting Calendar for Centaurea

Frost tolerance for centaurea: Tolerant of some frost.
When to plant: Up to 5 weeks before last frost.

Centaurea do well in moderate cold which means that you can get them planted earlier than plants that are more sensitive to the cold.

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

The earliest that you can plant centaurea in Forest Park 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 centaurea and expect a good harvest is probably September. Any later than that and your centaurea may not have a chance to fully mature. You can get started a little bit earlier by starting your centaurea indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost has passed is on April 15 in Forest Park. You can expect an average low temperature of -10°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Forest Park may not be accurate from year to year the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Since half of the time in Forest Park you get surprised by a frost after April 15 be ready to protect your centaurea in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Forest Park

Here is the info for USDA Zone 6a.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)October 15
Lowest Expected Low-10°F
Highest Expected Low-5°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -10°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near -5°F.

Plants to Grow in Forest Park

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Forest Park.