One of the first steps you take when you are making a decision about 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.

In Mount Carmel you can figure out when it's the best time to plant red hot pokers by referring to the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Red Hot Pokers

Frost tolerance for red hot pokers:	Very tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	Up to 7 weeks before last frost.

Red Hot Pokers do well in quite a bit of cold which tells us that you can plant them earlier in the year than other plants that might not handle the cold.

The earliest that you can plant red hot pokers in Mount Carmel 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 red hot pokers and expect a good harvest is probably September. If you wait any later than that and your red hot pokers may not have a chance to grow to maturity. If you are starting your red hot pokers indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a little bit earlier.

Last Frost Date

In Mount Carmel the average date of last frost happens on April 15. You can expect an average low temperature of -10°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Mount Carmel is an average the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Since half of the time in Mount Carmel it frosts late in the year after April 15 be ready to cover your red hot pokers in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Mount Carmel

Here is the info for USDA Zone 6a.

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

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

Plants to Grow in Mount Carmel

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Mount Carmel.