When to Plant Chrysanthemums in Los Altos, CA

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.

It's a good idea to figure out when you can plant chrysanthemums by using the USDA zone info for Los Altos.


Planting Calendar for Chrysanthemums

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

You can plant chrysanthemums a bit earlier in the year because they are one of those plants that can tolerate a tiny bit of cold weather.

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

The earliest that you can plant chrysanthemums in Los Altos 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 chrysanthemums and expect a good harvest is probably September. If you wait any later than that and your chrysanthemums may not have a chance to grow to maturity. You can get started a couple of weeks earlier by starting your chrysanthemums indoors.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is February 15 in Los Altos. You can expect an average low temperature of 25°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Los Altos is an average the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Since half of the time in Los Altos it frosts late in the year after February 15 be ready to protect your chrysanthemums in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Los Altos

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 Los Altos

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Los Altos.