One of the first steps you take when you are determining 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 first opportunity to plant mimulus in Scotts Valley can be figured out by reviewing the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Mimulus

Frost tolerance for mimulus:	Not tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	After the last frost when the weather gets warmer.

It's probably a bad idea to plant mimulus until after the last frost when the weather gets warmer because they require warm weather.

The earliest that you can plant mimulus in Scotts Valley is March. However, you really should wait until April if you don't want to take any chances.

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

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost has passed is on February 15 in Scotts Valley. It might get as low as 25°F during the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Scotts Valley may not be accurate from year to year the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Since half of the time in Scotts Valley it frosts late in the year after February 15 be ready to protect your mimulus if you have a late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Scotts Valley

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 Scotts Valley

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Scotts Valley.