When to Plant Cardinal Flower in Capitola, CA

The USDA Zone info is a great tool for gardeners to help us figure out your gardening schedule. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

You can figure out when it's a good idea to plant cardinal flower in Capitola by looking at the USDA zone info.


Planting Calendar for Cardinal Flower

Frost tolerance for cardinal flower: Not tolerant of frost.
When to plant: After the last frost when the weather gets warmer.

Cardinal Flower are not cold tolerant which tells us that you need to wait until it warms up after all chance of frost has passed before you can plant them.

JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
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A good time to plant cardinal flower
Possibly ok, but a risky time to plant cardinal flower
Probably not a good time to plant cardinal flower

The earliest that you can plant cardinal flower in Capitola 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 cardinal flower and expect a good harvest is probably September. If you wait any later than that and your cardinal flower may not have a chance to grow to maturity. If you are starting your cardinal flower indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a little bit earlier.

Last Frost Date

In Capitola the average date of last frost happens on February 15. It might get as low as 25°F during the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Capitola is just an average the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Half of the time in Capitola it frosts late in the year after February 15 so be sure to be ready to protect your cardinal flower if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Capitola

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 Low25°F
Highest Expected Low30°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 Capitola

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