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.

The earliest that you can plant gayfeather in Oakland can be estimated by referring to the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for Gayfeather

Frost tolerance for gayfeather:	Very tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	Up to 7 weeks before last frost.

Gayfeather do ok in quite a bit of cold which means that you can plant them earlier in the year than other frost tender plants.

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

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost is on April 15 in Oakland. It might get as low as -5°F during the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Oakland is not always accurate the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Since half of the time in Oakland it frosts late in the year after April 15 be ready to cover your gayfeather in the event of one of those late frosts.

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.