When to Plant Sunflowers in Laurel, MT

Before planting it is a good idea to find your USDA Zone info to figure out your garden schedule. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

The earliest that you can plant sunflowers in Laurel can be figured out by referring to the USDA zone info.


Planting Calendar for Sunflowers

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

It's probably a bad idea to plant sunflowers until after all chance of frost has passed because they are not cold tolerant.

JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Legend 
A good time to plant sunflowers
Possibly ok, but a risky time to plant sunflowers
Probably not a good time to plant sunflowers

The earliest that you can plant sunflowers in Laurel is May. However, you really should wait until June 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. Any later than that and your sunflowers may not have a chance to grow to maturity. If you are starting your sunflowers indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a few weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average all chance of frost has passed is on May 15 in Laurel. You should expect an average low temperature of -25°F in the coldest months of winter.

Just be sure to remember that USDA zone info for Laurel is not always accurate and the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Since half of the time in Laurel it frosts late in the year after May 15 be ready to cover your sunflowers in the event of a late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Laurel

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 Laurel

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