Viola · Archway, England, United Kingdom
When to sow violas in Archway
Main outdoor window
17 Mar - 21 Apr
The window this page is built around.
Timed from last spring frost
14 April
In Archway, on your chosen risk.
Ready to pick
10 Jun - 5 Jul
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 Archway
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 Jan - 24 Feb
Twelve weeks before your last frost, under cover or on a windowsill.
Plant out
17 Mar - 21 Apr
Four weeks before your last frost.
In flower
10 Jun - 5 Jul
Violas through the year
Against the frost risk in Archway
Why these dates
Start indoors twelve weeks before the last frost and plant out four weeks before it, or sow in midsummer for autumn planting and winter flowers. Shear back by half in midsummer if it looks exhausted and it will recover for autumn.
Hardy to about -18C, more so than the pansy, and flowers through mild winters. Handles summer heat slightly better too, though it still pauses in the hottest weeks.
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. Violas are timed from 12 weeks before that frost for an indoor start, with planting out 4 weeks before it, and this page simply resolves those offsets against the frost date computed for Archway.
Hardiness is not the obstacle here. Archway is zone 9a, 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 219 days, against 85 to 110 days to first flower for this crop counted from planting out. That margin is what decides whether a late sowing is worth attempting.
Also in Archway
Other flowers to time
Growing violas in Archway
When should I plant violas in Archway?
Aim for 17 Mar - 21 Apr in an average year. If you would rather not gamble on the weather, wait until 7 Apr - 12 May - by then frost has finished in nine years out of ten.
When will violas be ready to harvest in Archway?
Expect to start picking around 10 Jun - 5 Jul, based on 85 to 110 days to maturity from the planting date calculated for this location.
How much frost will violas tolerate?
Hardy to about -18C, more so than the pansy, and flowers through mild winters. Handles summer heat slightly better too, though it still pauses in the hottest weeks.