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.

One way of estimating when it's the best time to plant pennisetum is to examine the USDA zone info for Cypress.

Planting Calendar for Pennisetum

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

Since pennisetum are barely cold tolerant you can plant them just a tiny bit earlier in the year than more sensitive plants.

The earliest that you can plant pennisetum in Cypress 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 pennisetum and expect a good harvest is probably September. Any later than that and your pennisetum may not have a chance to really do well. If you are starting your pennisetum indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average all chance of frost has passed is on January 31 in Cypress. You should expect an average low temperature of 35°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Cypress is an average the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Since half of the time in Cypress you get surprised by a frost after January 31 be ready to protect your pennisetum in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Cypress

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 Cypress

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