One of the first steps you take when you are making a decision about 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.

A common way of making a decision about when it's possible to plant bougainvillea is to refer to the USDA zone info for Gainesville.

Planting Calendar for Bougainvillea

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

Bougainvillea do not do well in cold weather which means that it is necessary to wait until it warms up after the last frost before you can plant them.

The earliest that you can plant bougainvillea in Gainesville is April. However, you really should wait until May if you don't want to take any chances.

The last month that you can plant bougainvillea and expect a good harvest is probably August. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your bougainvillea may not have a chance to fully mature. You can get started a few weeks earlier by starting your bougainvillea indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average all chance of frost has passed is on April 15 in Gainesville. You can expect an average low temperature of 5°F in the coldest months of winter.

Remember that the actual date of last frost is not always accurate because it is based on the USDA zone info for Gainesville and it changes from year to year. Half of the time in Gainesville you get a frost after April 15 so make sure that you are prepared to protect your bougainvillea if you have a late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Gainesville

Here is the info for USDA Zone 7b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	October 15
Lowest Expected Low	5°F
Highest Expected Low	10°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is 5°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near 10°F.

Plants to Grow in Gainesville

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