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 River Forest should be reffered to in order to determine when you can plant melampodium.

Planting Calendar for Melampodium

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

Since melampodium do not do well in cold weather you have to wait until after the last frost before you can plant them.

The earliest that you can plant melampodium in River Forest 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 melampodium and expect a good harvest is probably August. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your melampodium may not have a chance to really do well. Starting your melampodium indoors is a great way to get them started a few weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is April 15 in River Forest. It might get as low as -10°F during the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for River Forest is just an average the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Since half of the time in River Forest it frosts late in the year after April 15 be ready to protect your melampodium if you have a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for River Forest

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 River Forest

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