When to Plant Garden Mums in Zion, IL

One of the first steps you take when you are estimating 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.

It's a good idea to figure out when you can plant garden mums by reviewing the USDA zone info for Zion.


Planting Calendar for Garden Mums

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

Garden Mums are moderately cold tolerant which tells us that you can get them planted earlier than plants that are more sensitive to 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 Zion 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. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your garden mums may not have a chance to grow to maturity. Starting your garden mums indoors is a great way to get them started a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost has passed is on April 15 in Zion. It might get as low as -15°F during the coldest months of winter.

It's important to remember that USDA zone info for Zion may not be accurate from year to year and the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Since half of the time in Zion you get a frost after April 15 be ready to protect your garden mums in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Zion

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 Zion

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