When to Plant Garden Mums in Harrisburg, IL

One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us estimate your gardening schedule is the USDA zone info. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

The best time to plant garden mums in Harrisburg can be estimated by referring to the USDA zone info.


Planting Calendar for Garden Mums

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

Since garden mums are one of those plants that can tolerate a little bit of cold weather you can plant them a bit earlier in the year than other plants that might not handle the cold.

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

The earliest that you can plant garden mums in Harrisburg 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 garden mums and expect a good harvest is probably September. If you wait any later than that and your garden mums may not have a chance to fully mature. You can get started a few weeks earlier by starting your garden mums indoors.

Last Frost Date

In Harrisburg the average date of last frost happens on April 15. In the coldest months of winter you can expect an average low temperature of -5°F.

Keep in mind that the actual date of last frost may not be accurate from year to year because it is based on the USDA zone info for Harrisburg and it can change quite a bit from year to year. Since half of the time in Harrisburg there is a last frost after April 15 be ready to protect your garden mums if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Harrisburg

Here is the info for USDA Zone 6b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)October 15
Lowest Expected Low-5°F
Highest Expected Low0°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -5°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near 0°F.

Plants to Grow in Harrisburg

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