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

A common way of making a decision about when to plant poppies is to refer to the USDA zone info for Ossining.

Planting Calendar for Poppies

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

You can plant poppies a little bit earlier in the year because they are one of those plants that can tolerate a little bit of cold weather.

The earliest that you can plant poppies in Ossining 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. If you wait 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 the last frost when the weather gets warmer is on April 15 in Ossining. You should expect an average low temperature of -5°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Ossining may not be accurate from year to year the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Since half of the time in Ossining you get surprised by a frost after April 15 be ready to cover your poppies in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Ossining

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 Low	0°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 Ossining

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