One of the best tools that you have as gardeners to help us estimate 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.

A way of getting a good idea when it's a good idea to plant echinacea is to use the USDA zone info for Oakland.

Planting Calendar for Echinacea

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

Echinacea are one of those plants that can tolerate a tiny bit of cold weather which means that you can plant them slightly earlier than more sensitive plants.

The earliest that you can plant echinacea in Oakland 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 echinacea and expect a good harvest is probably August. If you wait any later than that and your echinacea may not have a chance to really do well. You can get started a little bit earlier by starting your echinacea indoors.

Last Frost Date

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

Remember that the actual date of last frost is just an average because it is based on the USDA zone info for Oakland and it can change quite a bit from year to year. Since half of the time in Oakland there is a last frost after April 15 be ready to cover your echinacea in the event of a surprise late frost.

USDA Zone Info for Oakland

Here is the info for USDA Zone 6b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	April 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	October 15
Lowest Expected Low	-5°F
Highest Expected Low	0°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 0°F.

Plants to Grow in Oakland

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