One of the first steps you take when you are figuring out 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.

In Mount Prospect you can figure out when it's possible to plant gayfeather by looking at the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Gayfeather

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

Since gayfeather do well in cold you can plant them quite a bit earlier in the year than plants that are more sensitive to the cold.

The earliest that you can plant gayfeather in Mount Prospect 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 gayfeather and expect a good harvest is probably September. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your gayfeather may not have a chance to grow to maturity. You can get started a couple of weeks earlier by starting your gayfeather indoors.

Last Frost Date

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

Keep in mind that USDA zone info for Mount Prospect is just an average and the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Since half of the time in Mount Prospect it frosts late in the year after April 15 be ready to cover your gayfeather if you have a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Mount Prospect

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 Mount Prospect

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Mount Prospect.