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 Alcoa you can determine when to plant garden mums by looking at the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Garden Mums

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

Garden Mums are one of those plants that can tolerate a little bit of cold weather which tells us that you can plant them earlier than more sensitive plants.

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

Last Frost Date

In Alcoa the average date of last frost happens on April 15. In the coldest months of winter you can expect an average low temperature of 0°F.

It's important to remember that USDA zone info for Alcoa is just an average and the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Half of the time in Alcoa last frost occurs after April 15 so make sure that you are ready to protect your garden mums in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Alcoa

Here is the info for USDA Zone 7a.

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

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is 0°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near 5°F.

Plants to Grow in Alcoa

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