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

You should be able to estimate when you can plant sunflowers by checking out the USDA zone info for Laurel.

Planting Calendar for Sunflowers

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

Sunflowers are not cold tolerant which means that you have to wait until it warms up after the last frost has passed before you can plant them.

The earliest that you can plant sunflowers in Laurel 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 sunflowers and expect a good harvest is probably August. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your sunflowers may not have a chance to really do well. You can get started a little bit earlier by starting your sunflowers indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost when the weather gets warmer is on April 15 in Laurel. It might get as low as 0°F during the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Laurel is an average the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Half of the time in Laurel you get a frost after April 15 so be sure to be ready to protect your sunflowers if you have a late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Laurel

Here is the info for USDA Zone 7a.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	October 15
Lowest Expected Low	0°F
Highest Expected Low	5°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is 0°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near 5°F.

Plants to Grow in Laurel

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