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 common way of figuring out when it's the best time to plant festuca is to look at the USDA zone info for Brookings.

Planting Calendar for Festuca

Frost tolerance for festuca:	Tolerant of some frost.
When to plant:	Up to 5 weeks before last frost.

Festuca can survive in a little bit of cold which means that you can plant them just a bit earlier in the year than plants that are more sensitive to the cold.

The earliest that you can plant festuca in Brookings is January. However, you really should wait until February if you don't want to take any chances.

The last month that you can plant festuca and expect a good harvest is probably October. Any later than that and your festuca may not have a chance to grow to maturity. You can get started a few weeks earlier by starting your festuca indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average the last frost when the weather gets warmer is on February 15 in Brookings. In the coldest months of winter you should expect an average low temperature of 25°F.

Since the USDA zone info for Brookings is an average the actual date of last frost will vary from year to year. Half of the time in Brookings last frost occurs after February 15 so always be ready to cover your festuca if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Brookings

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 Brookings

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