One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us estimate 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.

A common way of figuring out when it's the best time to plant kale is to examine the USDA zone info for San Francisco.

Planting Calendar for Kale

Frost tolerance for kale:	Tolerant of some frost.
When to plant:	Up to 5 weeks before last frost.

You can plant kale just a bit earlier in the year because they do well in moderate cold.

The earliest that you can plant kale in San Francisco 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 kale and expect a good harvest is probably October. If you wait any later than that and your kale may not have a chance to grow to maturity. If you are starting your kale indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a few weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is January 31 in San Francisco. You can expect an average low temperature of 35°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for San Francisco is just an average the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in San Francisco there is a last frost after January 31 so always be ready to protect your kale in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for San Francisco

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 San Francisco

You may be interested in your other planting guides for San Francisco.