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.

The best time to plant garden mums in Costa Mesa can be estimated by referring to the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Garden Mums

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

Garden Mums are moderately cold tolerant which means that you can plant them earlier than other plants that might not handle the cold.

The earliest that you can plant garden mums in Costa Mesa 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 really do well. If you are starting your garden mums indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost has passed is on January 31 in Costa Mesa. You can expect an average low temperature of 35°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Costa Mesa may not be accurate from year to year the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Half of the time in Costa Mesa there is a last frost after January 31 so just be sure to be ready to protect your garden mums in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Costa Mesa

Here is the info for USDA Zone 10b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	January 31
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	December 15
Lowest Expected Low	35°F
Highest Expected Low	40°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is 35°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near 40°F.

Plants to Grow in Costa Mesa

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Costa Mesa.