One of the first steps you take when you are determining 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 making a decision about when you can plant mimulus is to check out the USDA zone info for Rio Rancho.

Planting Calendar for Mimulus

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

It's not a good idea to plant mimulus until after the last frost because they are not cold tolerant.

The earliest that you can plant mimulus in Rio Rancho is April. However, you really should wait until May if you don't want to take any chances.

The last month that you can plant mimulus and expect a good harvest is probably August. If you wait any later than that and your mimulus may not have a chance to grow to maturity. You can get started a little bit earlier by starting your mimulus indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost has passed is on April 15 in Rio Rancho. In the coldest months of winter you can expect an average low temperature of 5°F.

Keep in mind that the actual date of last frost is not always accurate because it is based on the USDA zone info for Rio Rancho and it is different every year. Since half of the time in Rio Rancho it frosts late in the year after April 15 be ready to cover your mimulus in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Rio Rancho

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 Rio Rancho

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Rio Rancho.