One of the first steps you take when you are figuring out 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 Madison should be reffered to in order to determine when you can plant dipladenia.

Planting Calendar for Dipladenia

Frost tolerance for dipladenia:	Not tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	After the last frost has passed.

It's probably a bad idea to plant dipladenia until after the last frost when the weather gets warmer because they require warm weather.

The earliest that you can plant dipladenia in Madison 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 dipladenia and expect a good harvest is probably August. If you wait any later than that and your dipladenia may not have a chance to grow to maturity. If you are starting your dipladenia indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is April 15 in Madison. In the coldest months of winter you should expect an average low temperature of -5°F.

Remember that the actual date of last frost is an average because it is based on the USDA zone info for Madison and it is different every year. Half of the time in Madison it frosts late in the year after April 15 so make sure that you are ready to cover your dipladenia in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Madison

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 Low	0°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 Madison

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