One of the first steps you take when you are making a decision about 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.

You should be able to determine when it's the best time to plant gomphrena by looking at the USDA zone info for San Jose.

Planting Calendar for Gomphrena

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

Since gomphrena are one of those plants that can tolerate a tiny bit of cold weather you can plant them slightly earlier in the year than more sensitive plants.

The earliest that you can plant gomphrena in San Jose 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 gomphrena and expect a good harvest is probably September. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your gomphrena may not have a chance to really do well. Starting your gomphrena indoors is a great way to get them started a little bit earlier.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is February 15 in San Jose. It might get as low as 25°F during the coldest months of winter.

Remember that USDA zone info for San Jose is an average and the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Since half of the time in San Jose it frosts late in the year after February 15 be ready to cover your gomphrena if you have a late frost.

USDA Zone Info for San Jose

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 San Jose

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