One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us figure out your gardening schedule is the USDA zone info. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

You will be able to figure out when it's possible to plant festuca by using the USDA zone info for Cottonwood.

Planting Calendar for Festuca

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

Festuca do ok in mild cold which tells us that you can plant them a little bit earlier in the year than plants that are more sensitive to the cold.

The earliest that you can plant festuca in Cottonwood 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 festuca and expect a good harvest is probably September. Any later than that and your festuca may not have a chance to really do well. If you are starting your festuca indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost when the weather gets warmer is on March 15 in Cottonwood. It might get as low as 15°F during the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Cottonwood is not always accurate the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in Cottonwood last frost occurs after March 15 so make sure that you are prepared to protect your festuca if you have a late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Cottonwood

Here is the info for USDA Zone 8b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	March 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	November 15
Lowest Expected Low	15°F
Highest Expected Low	20°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is 15°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near 20°F.

Plants to Grow in Cottonwood

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