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 earliest that you can plant melampodium in Soledad can be estimated by checking out the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Melampodium

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

You should not plant melampodium until after the last frost has passed because they require warm weather.

The earliest that you can plant melampodium in Soledad 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 melampodium and expect a good harvest is probably September. If you wait any later than that and your melampodium may not have a chance to really do well. You can get started a little bit earlier by starting your melampodium indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost when the weather gets warmer is on February 15 in Soledad. It might get as low as 25°F during the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Soledad is just an average the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Since half of the time in Soledad you get surprised by a frost after February 15 be ready to cover your melampodium if you have a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Soledad

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 Soledad

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