One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us determine 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.

A common way of figuring out when you can plant basil is to use the USDA zone info for Calimesa.

Planting Calendar for Basil

Frost tolerance for basil:	Not tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	After all chance of frost has passed.

Basil require warm weather which means that it's important to wait until it warms up after the last frost when the weather gets warmer before you can plant them.

The earliest that you can plant basil in Calimesa is March. However, you really should wait until April if you don't want to take any chances.

The last month that you can plant basil and expect a good harvest is probably September. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your basil may not have a chance to really do well. You can get started a couple of weeks earlier by starting your basil indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average all chance of frost has passed is on February 15 in Calimesa. In the coldest months of winter you should expect an average low temperature of 25°F.

Since the USDA zone info for Calimesa is not always accurate the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Half of the time in Calimesa you get a frost after February 15 so make sure that you are prepared to cover your basil if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Calimesa

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 Calimesa

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