When to Plant Gayfeather in Goleta, 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.

A way of making a decision about when it's a good idea to plant gayfeather is to look at the USDA zone info for Goleta.


Planting Calendar for Gayfeather

Frost tolerance for gayfeather: Very tolerant of frost.
When to plant: Up to 7 weeks before last frost.

Gayfeather tend to make it in a bit of cold which means that you can plant them earlier in the year than other frost tender plants.

JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Legend 
A good time to plant gayfeather
Possibly ok, but a risky time to plant gayfeather
Probably not a good time to plant gayfeather

The earliest that you can plant gayfeather in Goleta 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 gayfeather and expect a good harvest is probably October. If you wait any later than that and your gayfeather may not have a chance to really do well. Starting your gayfeather indoors is a great way to get them started a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost when the weather gets warmer is on February 15 in Goleta. You should expect an average low temperature of 25°F in the coldest months of winter.

It's important to remember that USDA zone info for Goleta is an average and the actual date of last frost is different every year. Half of the time in Goleta last frost occurs after February 15 so make sure that you are prepared to protect your gayfeather in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Goleta

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 Goleta

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