One of the first steps you take when you are getting a good idea 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.

You can figure out when it's a good idea to plant sunflowers in Clearwater by using the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Sunflowers

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

Since sunflowers do not do well in cold weather you really should wait until after all chance of frost has passed before you can plant them.

The earliest that you can plant sunflowers in Clearwater 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 sunflowers and expect a good harvest is probably September. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your sunflowers may not have a chance to really do well. You can get started a couple of weeks earlier by starting your sunflowers indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost is on January 31 in Clearwater. It might get as low as 30°F during the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Clearwater may not be accurate from year to year the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Half of the time in Clearwater you get surprised by a frost after January 31 so make sure that you are ready to cover your sunflowers if you have a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Clearwater

Here is the info for USDA Zone 10a.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	January 31
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	December 15
Lowest Expected Low	30°F
Highest Expected Low	35°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is 30°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near 35°F.

Plants to Grow in Clearwater

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