The USDA Zone info is a great tool for gardeners to help us determine your gardening 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 you can plant centaurea is to look at the USDA zone info for Salida.

Planting Calendar for Centaurea

Frost tolerance for centaurea:	Tolerant of some frost.
When to plant:	Up to 5 weeks before last frost.

Centaurea are moderately cold tolerant which means that you can start planting them earlier than more sensitive plants.

The earliest that you can plant centaurea in Salida 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 centaurea and expect a good harvest is probably September. Any later than that and your centaurea may not have a chance to grow to maturity. You can get started a little bit earlier by starting your centaurea indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost when the weather gets warmer is on April 15 in Salida. In the coldest months of winter you should expect an average low temperature of -15°F.

Since the USDA zone info for Salida is an average the actual date of last frost can change quite a bit from year to year. Since half of the time in Salida you get a frost after April 15 be ready to cover your centaurea in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Salida

Here is the info for USDA Zone 5b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	October 15
Lowest Expected Low	-15°F
Highest Expected Low	-10°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -15°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near -10°F.

Plants to Grow in Salida

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