When to Plant Cardinal Flower in Hudson, WI

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.

The USDA zone info for Hudson can be read to determine when you can plant cardinal flower.


Planting Calendar for Cardinal Flower

Frost tolerance for cardinal flower: Not tolerant of frost.
When to plant: After the last frost when the weather gets warmer.

Since cardinal flower are not cold tolerant you must wait until after the last frost when the weather gets warmer before you can plant them.

JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Legend 
A good time to plant cardinal flower
Possibly ok, but a risky time to plant cardinal flower
Probably not a good time to plant cardinal flower

The earliest that you can plant cardinal flower in Hudson is May. However, you really should wait until June if you don't want to take any chances.

The last month that you can plant cardinal flower and expect a good harvest is probably August. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your cardinal flower may not have a chance to really do well. If you are starting your cardinal flower indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a few weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average all chance of frost has passed is on May 15 in Hudson. It might get as low as -25°F during the coldest months of winter.

It's important to remember that USDA zone info for Hudson is an average and the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Since half of the time in Hudson it frosts late in the year after May 15 be ready to protect your cardinal flower if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Hudson

Here is the info for USDA Zone 4b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)May 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)September 15
Lowest Expected Low-25°F
Highest Expected Low-20°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -25°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near -20°F.

Plants to Grow in Hudson

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