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.

A way of figuring out when to plant monarda is to use the USDA zone info for Chico.

Planting Calendar for Monarda

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

You can plant monarda a bit earlier in the year because they are one of those plants that can tolerate a tiny bit of cold weather.

The earliest that you can plant monarda in Chico 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 monarda and expect a good harvest is probably September. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your monarda may not have a chance to fully mature. If you are starting your monarda indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is February 15 in Chico. It might get as low as 20°F during the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Chico is an average the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Since half of the time in Chico it frosts late in the year after February 15 be ready to cover your monarda in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Chico

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 Chico

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