When to Plant Garden Mums in Zone 3a

Before planting it is a good idea to find your USDA Zone info to figure out your garden schedule. 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 Zone 3a should be read to estimate when it's the best time to plant garden mums.

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Planting Calendar for Garden Mums

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

You can plant garden mums just a bit earlier in the year because they do well in moderate cold.

JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Legend 
A good time to plant garden mums
Possibly ok, but a risky time to plant garden mums
Probably not a good time to plant garden mums

The earliest that you can plant garden mums in Zone 3a is March. However, you really should wait until April 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 August. If you wait any later than that and your garden mums may not have a chance to fully mature. You can get started a little bit earlier by starting your garden mums indoors.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is May 15 in Zone 3a. You can expect an average low temperature of -40°F in the coldest months of winter.

Keep in mind that USDA zone info for Zone 3a is just an average and the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Since half of the time in Zone 3a you get surprised by a frost after May 15 be ready to protect your garden mums in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Zone 3a

Here is the info for USDA Zone 3a.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)May 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)September 15
Lowest Expected Low-40°F
Highest Expected Low-35°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -40°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near -35°F.

Plants to Grow in Zone 3a

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Zone 3a.