When to Plant Garden Mums in Morro Bay, 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 most important data that the zone info tells us is average last frost and the lowest expected temperature for your area.

The USDA zone info for Morro Bay can be looked at to determine when to plant garden mums.


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 can survive in some cold which means that you can plant them a little bit earlier in the year than other plants that might not handle the cold.

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

The earliest that you can plant garden mums in Morro Bay 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 fully mature. If you are starting your garden mums indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a few weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost has passed is on February 15 in Morro Bay. You can expect an average low temperature of 25°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Morro Bay may not be accurate from year to year the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Since half of the time in Morro Bay it frosts late in the year after February 15 be ready to protect your garden mums in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Morro Bay

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 Morro Bay

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Morro Bay.