Before planting it is a good idea to find your USDA Zone info to figure out your garden schedule. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

A way of determining when it's the best time to plant garden cress is to examine the USDA zone info for Santa Monica.

Planting Calendar for Garden cress

Frost tolerance for garden cress:	Not tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	After the last frost has passed.

Since garden cress do not do well in cold weather it's important to wait until after all chance of frost has passed before you can plant them.

The earliest that you can plant garden cress in Santa Monica 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 garden cress and expect a good harvest is probably September. Any later than that and your garden cress may not have a chance to fully mature. Starting your garden cress indoors is a great way to get them started a little bit earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost has passed is on January 31 in Santa Monica. You can expect an average low temperature of 35°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Santa Monica 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 Santa Monica last frost occurs after January 31 be ready to cover your garden cress in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Santa Monica

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 Santa Monica

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