One of the first steps you take when you are making a decision about your gardening schedule is find your USDA Zone info. 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 Avenal should be reffered to in order to figure out when it's a good idea to plant rock cress.

Planting Calendar for Rock Cress

Frost tolerance for rock cress:	Very tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	Up to 7 weeks before last frost.

You can plant rock cress earlier in the year because they do well in cold.

The earliest that you can plant rock cress in Avenal is January. However, you really should wait until February if you don't want to take any chances.

The last month that you can plant rock cress and expect a good harvest is probably October. If you wait any later than that and your rock cress may not have a chance to fully mature. You can get started a few weeks earlier by starting your rock cress indoors.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is February 15 in Avenal. It might get as low as 25°F during the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Avenal is an average the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Half of the time in Avenal last frost occurs after February 15 so be sure to be ready to cover your rock cress in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Avenal

Here is the info for USDA Zone 9b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	February 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	December 15
Lowest Expected Low	25°F
Highest Expected Low	30°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is 25°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near 30°F.

Plants to Grow in Avenal

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