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When to Plant Garden Mums in Mankato, MN

One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us determine your gardening schedule is the USDA zone info. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

The first chance to plant garden mums in Mankato can be figured out by referring to the USDA zone info.


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 one of those plants that can tolerate a little bit of cold weather which means that you can get them planted earlier than other plants that might not handle 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 Mankato is March. However, you really should wait until April 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 August. If you wait any later than that and your garden mums may not have a chance to fully mature. If you are starting your garden mums indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a few weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

In Mankato the average date of last frost happens on May 15. It might get as low as -25°F during the coldest months of winter.

Just be sure to remember that the actual date of last frost may not be accurate from year to year because it is based on the USDA zone info for Mankato and it is different every year. Half of the time in Mankato it frosts late in the year after May 15 so make sure that you are ready to protect your garden mums in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Mankato

Here is the info for USDA Zone 4b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)May 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)September 15
Lowest Expected Low-25°F
Highest Expected Low-20°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -25°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near -20°F.

Plants to Grow in Mankato

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