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 way of estimating when it's possible to plant garden mums is to check out the USDA zone info for Colton.

Planting Calendar for Garden Mums

Frost tolerance for garden mums:	Tolerant of some frost.
When to plant:	Up to 5 weeks before last frost.

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

The earliest that you can plant garden mums in Colton 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 garden mums and expect a good harvest is probably October. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your garden mums may not have a chance to grow to maturity. You can get started a couple of weeks earlier by starting your garden mums indoors.

Last Frost Date

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

Since the USDA zone info for Colton may not be accurate from year to year the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Half of the time in Colton last frost occurs after February 15 so make sure that you are prepared to cover your garden mums if you have a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Colton

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 Colton

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