When to Plant Tarragon in San Jose, 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.

The USDA zone info for San Jose can be looked at to figure out when it's possible to plant tarragon.


Planting Calendar for Tarragon

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

Since tarragon do ok in moderate cold you can plant them a bit earlier in the year than other frost tender plants.

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

The earliest that you can plant tarragon 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 tarragon and expect a good harvest is probably September. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your tarragon may not have a chance to grow to maturity. You can get started a little bit earlier by starting your tarragon indoors.

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is February 15 in San Jose. In the coldest months of winter you can expect an average low temperature of 25°F.

Since the USDA zone info for San Jose may not be accurate from year to year the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Half of the time in San Jose last frost occurs after February 15 so be sure to be ready to protect your tarragon 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 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 San Jose

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