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.

You will be able to figure out when it's possible to plant red hot pokers by referring to the USDA zone info for Alexandria.

Planting Calendar for Red Hot Pokers

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

Since red hot pokers are one of those plants that can tolerate quite a bit of cold weather you can plant them much earlier in the year than more sensitive plants.

The earliest that you can plant red hot pokers in Alexandria 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 red hot pokers and expect a good harvest is probably September. If you wait any later than that and your red hot pokers may not have a chance to fully mature. You can get started a couple of weeks earlier by starting your red hot pokers indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average all chance of frost has passed is on March 15 in Alexandria. You can expect an average low temperature of 15°F in the coldest months of winter.

Just be sure to remember that the actual date of last frost is an average because it is based on the USDA zone info for Alexandria and it will vary from year to year. Since half of the time in Alexandria last frost occurs after March 15 be ready to protect your red hot pokers if you have a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Alexandria

Here is the info for USDA Zone 8b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	March 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	November 15
Lowest Expected Low	15°F
Highest Expected Low	20°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 20°F.

Plants to Grow in Alexandria

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