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.

You should be able to determine when it's a good idea to plant dahlia by looking at the USDA zone info for Gainesville.

Planting Calendar for Dahlia

Frost tolerance for dahlia:	Not tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	After the last frost.

Since dahlia require warm weather you need to wait until after the last frost has passed before you can plant them.

The earliest that you can plant dahlia in Gainesville 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 dahlia and expect a good harvest is probably September. If you wait any later than that and your dahlia may not have a chance to really do well. If you are starting your dahlia indoors then you might be able to get away with starting them a couple of weeks earlier.

Last Frost Date

In Gainesville the average date of last frost happens on February 15. You should expect an average low temperature of 20°F in the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Gainesville is just an average the actual date of last frost changes from year to year. Since half of the time in Gainesville last frost occurs after February 15 be ready to protect your dahlia if you have a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Gainesville

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 Gainesville

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