Before planting it is a good idea to find your USDA Zone info to determine your garden schedule. 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 Shafter can be used to determine when you can plant cleome.

Planting Calendar for Cleome

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

Cleome require warm weather which means that you must wait until it warms up after the last frost has passed before you can plant them.

The earliest that you can plant cleome in Shafter 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 cleome and expect a good harvest is probably September. If you wait any later than that and your cleome may not have a chance to fully mature. Starting your cleome indoors is a great way to get them started a few weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

On average all chance of frost has passed is on February 15 in Shafter. You can expect an average low temperature of 20°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Shafter is just an average the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Since half of the time in Shafter you get a frost after February 15 be ready to protect your cleome in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Shafter

Here is the info for USDA Zone 9a.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	February 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	December 15
Lowest Expected Low	20°F
Highest Expected Low	25°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is 20°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near 25°F.

Plants to Grow in Shafter

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Shafter.