One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us determine your gardening schedule is the USDA zone info. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

One way of making a decision about when it's a good idea to plant petunias is to check out the USDA zone info for Winter Garden.

Planting Calendar for Petunias

Frost tolerance for petunias:	Tolerant of a very small amount of frost.
When to plant:	Up to 3 weeks before last frost.

Petunias do ok in moderate cold which means that you can plant them slightly earlier than more sensitive plants.

The earliest that you can plant petunias in Winter Garden 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 petunias and expect a good harvest is probably September. If you wait any later than that and your petunias may not have a chance to fully mature. You can get started a couple of weeks earlier by starting your petunias indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost is on February 15 in Winter Garden. In the coldest months of winter you should expect an average low temperature of 25°F.

Keep in mind that the actual date of last frost is not always accurate because it is based on the USDA zone info for Winter Garden and it can change quite a bit from year to year. Half of the time in Winter Garden you get surprised by a frost after February 15 so always be ready to cover your petunias in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Winter Garden

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 Winter Garden

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Winter Garden.