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.

The first opportunity to plant echinacea in Atascadero should be figured out by referring to the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Echinacea

Frost tolerance for echinacea:	Tolerant of a very small amount of frost.
When to plant:	Up to 3 weeks before last frost.

Since echinacea do ok in moderate cold you can plant them a bit earlier in the year than other frost tender plants.

The earliest that you can plant echinacea in Atascadero 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 echinacea and expect a good harvest is probably September. If you wait any later than that and your echinacea may not have a chance to grow to maturity. You can get started a few weeks earlier by starting your echinacea indoors.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is February 15 in Atascadero. You can expect an average low temperature of 20°F in the coldest months of winter.

Always keep in mind that USDA zone info for Atascadero is not always accurate and the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Half of the time in Atascadero last frost occurs after February 15 so make sure that you are prepared to protect your echinacea if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Atascadero

Here is the info for USDA Zone 9a.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	February 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	December 15
Lowest Expected Low	20°F
Highest Expected Low	25°F

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

Plants to Grow in Atascadero

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