One of the first steps you take when you are figuring out 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.

The USDA zone info for Santa Maria should be used to determine when it's a good idea to plant gerbera.

Planting Calendar for Gerbera

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

You can plant gerbera a bit earlier in the year because they are barely cold tolerant.

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

Last Frost Date

The average date of last frost is February 15 in Santa Maria. You should expect an average low temperature of 25°F in the coldest months of winter.

Remember that the actual date of last frost is an average because it is based on the USDA zone info for Santa Maria and it is different every year. Half of the time in Santa Maria it frosts late in the year after February 15 so make sure that you are prepared to protect your gerbera in the event of a late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Santa Maria

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 Santa Maria

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Santa Maria.