Before planting it is a good idea to find your USDA Zone info to estimate your garden schedule. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

In Mentor you can figure out when it's a good idea to plant california poppy by using the USDA zone info.

Planting Calendar for California Poppy

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

You can plant california poppy slightly earlier in the year because they are barely cold tolerant.

The earliest that you can plant california poppy in Mentor 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 california poppy and expect a good harvest is probably August. If you wait any later than that and your california poppy may not have a chance to really do well. You can get started a couple of weeks earlier by starting your california poppy indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average all chance of frost has passed is on April 15 in Mentor. It might get as low as -5°F during the coldest months of winter.

Since the USDA zone info for Mentor is just an average the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Half of the time in Mentor you get surprised by a frost after April 15 so be sure to be ready to protect your california poppy in the event of one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Mentor

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 Mentor

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