One of the first steps you take when you are figuring out 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.

A way of determining when it's a good idea to plant poppies is to look at the USDA zone info for Vinton.

Planting Calendar for Poppies

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

Since poppies are one of those plants that can tolerate a little bit of cold weather you can plant them a little earlier in the year than other frost tender plants.

The earliest that you can plant poppies in Vinton 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 little bit earlier by starting your poppies indoors.

Last Frost Date

In Vinton the average date of last frost happens on April 15. You should expect an average low temperature of 0°F in the coldest months of winter.

It's important to remember that USDA zone info for Vinton is an average and the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Since half of the time in Vinton you get surprised by a frost after April 15 be ready to protect your poppies in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Vinton

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 Vinton

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