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.

In Chester you can determine when you can plant oriental poppies by referring to the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Oriental poppies

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

Oriental poppies do ok in some cold which means that you can plant them a bit earlier in the year than other plants that might not handle the cold.

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

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is April 15 in Chester. You should expect an average low temperature of 5°F in the coldest months of winter.

Keep in mind that USDA zone info for Chester is just an average and the actual date of last frost is different every year. Since half of the time in Chester there is a last frost after April 15 be ready to protect your oriental poppies in the event of a late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Chester

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 Chester

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