One of the first steps you take when you are determining your gardening schedule is find your USDA Zone info. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

A common way of making a decision about when you can plant elephant ears is to look at the USDA zone info for Guadalupe.

Planting Calendar for Elephant Ears

Frost tolerance for elephant ears:	Not tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	After all chance of frost has passed.

It's probably a bad idea to plant elephant ears until after the last frost when the weather gets warmer because they do not do well in cold weather.

The earliest that you can plant elephant ears in Guadalupe is March. However, you really should wait until April if you don't want to take any chances.

The last month that you can plant elephant ears and expect a good harvest is probably September. If you wait any later than that and your elephant ears may not have a chance to grow to maturity. If you are starting your elephant ears indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

In Guadalupe the average date of last frost happens on February 15. It might get as low as 25°F during the coldest months of winter.

Remember that USDA zone info for Guadalupe is not always accurate and the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Since half of the time in Guadalupe you get surprised by a frost after February 15 be ready to protect your elephant ears in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Guadalupe

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 Guadalupe

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