Annual scabious · Changam-ch’on, South Hamgyong, North Korea
When to sow annual scabious in Changam-ch’on
Main outdoor window
3 Apr - 1 May
The window this page is built around.
Timed from last spring frost
17 April
In Changam-ch’on, on your chosen risk.
Ready to pick
2 Jul - 1 Aug
If you plant at the start of the window.
The average last frost. Half of all years are later than this.
Step by step in Changam-ch’on
Each window is a range, not a single day. Earlier in the range buys you a longer season; later in it buys you a safer one.
Start indoors
20 Feb - 20 Mar
Eight weeks before your last frost, under cover or on a windowsill.
Sow direct
3 Apr - 1 May
Two weeks before your last frost.
Plant out
10 Apr - 8 May
One week before your last frost.
In flower
2 Jul - 1 Aug
Annual scabious through the year
Against the frost risk in Changam-ch’on
Why these dates
Sow indoors eight weeks before the last frost and plant out a week before it, or sow direct two weeks before. Pick or deadhead every few days: this is a plant that stops the moment it is allowed to set seed, and keeps going for three months if it is not.
Hardy to about -8C, so young plants take a light frost and autumn sowing works in zone 8 and milder. Keeps flowering through the first autumn frosts.
Seed packets and extension guides express timing as weeks either side of the last spring frost, because that is the only reference point that travels. Annual scabious are timed from 8 weeks before that frost for an indoor start, with planting out 1 weeks before it, and this page simply resolves those offsets against the frost date computed for Changam-ch’on.
Hardiness is not the obstacle here. Changam-ch’on is zone 6b, comfortably inside the range this crop is rated for, so an established plant should come through an average winter without protection.
The median frost-free season here is 194 days, against 90 to 120 days to first flower for this crop counted from sowing. That margin is what decides whether a late sowing is worth attempting.
Also in Changam-ch’on
Other flowers to time
Growing annual scabious in Changam-ch’on
When should I plant annual scabious in Changam-ch’on?
Aim for 3 Apr - 1 May in an average year. If you would rather not gamble on the weather, wait until 11 Apr - 9 May - by then frost has finished in nine years out of ten.
When will annual scabious be ready to harvest in Changam-ch’on?
Expect to start picking around 2 Jul - 1 Aug, based on 90 to 120 days to maturity from the planting date calculated for this location.
How much frost will annual scabious tolerate?
Hardy to about -8C, so young plants take a light frost and autumn sowing works in zone 8 and milder. Keeps flowering through the first autumn frosts.