One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us estimate 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.

One way of determining when it's a good idea to plant poppies is to check out the USDA zone info for Albemarle.

Planting Calendar for Poppies

Frost tolerance for poppies:	Tolerant of some frost.
When to plant:	Up to 5 weeks before last frost.

Poppies are moderately cold tolerant which means that you can start planting them earlier than other frost tender plants.

The earliest that you can plant poppies in Albemarle 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 poppies and expect a good harvest is probably September. Any later than that and your poppies may not have a chance to grow to maturity. You can get started a couple of weeks earlier by starting your poppies indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average all chance of frost has passed is on April 15 in Albemarle. It might get as low as 5°F during the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Albemarle is just an average the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Half of the time in Albemarle last frost occurs after April 15 so make sure that you are ready to protect your poppies in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Albemarle

Here is the info for USDA Zone 7b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	October 15
Lowest Expected Low	5°F
Highest Expected Low	10°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is 5°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near 10°F.

Plants to Grow in Albemarle

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