When to Plant Peonies in East Rochester, NY

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.

One way of figuring out when you can plant peonies is to examine the USDA zone info for East Rochester.


Planting Calendar for Peonies

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

Peonies do well in very little cold which means that you can plant them just a tiny bit earlier in the year than other plants that might not handle the cold.

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

The earliest that you can plant peonies in East Rochester 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 peonies and expect a good harvest is probably August. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your peonies may not have a chance to fully mature. If you are starting your peonies indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

In East Rochester the average date of last frost happens on April 15. You can expect an average low temperature of -5°F in 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 East Rochester and it can change quite a bit from year to year. Since half of the time in East Rochester it frosts late in the year after April 15 be ready to cover your peonies if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for East Rochester

Here is the info for USDA Zone 6b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)October 15
Lowest Expected Low-5°F
Highest Expected Low0°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 0°F.

Plants to Grow in East Rochester

You may be interested in your other planting guides for East Rochester.