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.

A common way of figuring out when it's the best time to plant gayfeather is to examine the USDA zone info for Ludington.

Planting Calendar for Gayfeather

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

Since gayfeather are very cold tolerant you can plant them much earlier in the year than other frost tender plants.

The earliest that you can plant gayfeather in Ludington 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. If you wait any later than that and your gayfeather may not have a chance to really do well. You can get started a few weeks earlier by starting your gayfeather indoors.

Last Frost Date

In Ludington the average date of last frost happens on April 15. In the coldest months of winter you can expect an average low temperature of -10°F.

Since the USDA zone info for Ludington is not always accurate the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Since half of the time in Ludington 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 Ludington

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 Ludington

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