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.

One way of determining when it's possible to plant balloon flower is to examine the USDA zone info for Rutherford.

Planting Calendar for Balloon Flower

Frost tolerance for balloon flower:	Tolerant of a very small amount of frost.
When to plant:	Up to 3 weeks before last frost.

Balloon Flower do ok in moderate cold which means that you can start planting them slightly earlier than other plants that might not handle the cold.

The earliest that you can plant balloon flower in Rutherford 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 balloon flower and expect a good harvest is probably August. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your balloon flower may not have a chance to really do well. Starting your balloon flower indoors is a great way to get them started a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

In Rutherford the average date of last frost happens on April 15. You should expect an average low temperature of 0°F in the coldest months of winter.

Remember that USDA zone info for Rutherford is an average and the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Since half of the time in Rutherford you get surprised by a frost after April 15 be ready to cover your balloon flower in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Rutherford

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 Rutherford

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