Zone 9 Planting Schedule: Vegetable Calendar for 9a and 9b

Your zone is a winter low, not a planting date. The USDA zone map rates the average coldest winter night, which tells you which perennials survive. In zone 9, frost sets the start of spring and summer heat sets most of the rest, so the planting dates below come from extension calendars written for zone 9 areas. Your own frost dates are in our frost date calculator.

Last and first frost in zone 9

These are NOAA 1991-2020 normals for a 32 F night at five airports, each the weather station nearest a ZIP that the 2023 USDA map puts in zone 9. Each date is a median: in about half of years the last spring frost comes later. The 1 year in 10 column is the date after which a spring frost comes in only 1 year in 10.

Zone 9 median: last frost Feb 22 (Sacramento, CA), first frost Dec 7 (Jacksonville, FL); 285 frost-free days, the middle of the five in the table (the two median dates come from different stations, so they sit 288 days apart, our count). They set the start of spring; the planting dates below come from extension calendars. Inside one zone the last frost still spans Feb 5 to Mar 12, about 5 weeks, and the first frost Nov 16 to Dec 9, which is why your ZIP beats your zone: enter it in our frost date calculator for the station nearest you.

The zone line does not sort frost dates either: Austin, TX, in zone 9a, has its median last frost on Mar 12, 4 days later (our count) than Dallas-Fort Worth, TX, in zone 8b (Mar 8).

Zone 9 planting windows from extension calendars

In zone 9, summer heat ends most cool-season crops before frost does, and fall and winter are their main planting seasons, so the dates on this page come from extension calendars, not frost math. This table gives what three of them print, crop by crop: Texas A&M AgriLife's calendar for the San Antonio area, UF/IFAS for north Florida, which includes Jacksonville, and the University of California Master Gardener sheet's column for the Sacramento and San Joaquin valleys.

Each cell gives the dated windows the calendar prints; its undated advice is left out, and the season labels are ours. A month alone means the whole month. The last column runs from the earliest date to the latest across the calendars (our count); "calendars differ" means two of them open or close more than two weeks apart. The Houston, Austin and Tucson calendars draw their windows as bars with no dates printed, so they are not in the table. UF/IFAS's north Florida cauliflower cell also prints a fall window too garbled to read, so only its Jan to Feb is given. Texas A&M's San Antonio fall cabbage row runs the variety line into "Cabbage transplants", so the PDF does not say whether its Jul 10 to Sep 10 is for seed or transplants; the table says plant.

Summer heat in zone 9: what stops, the fall season, shade and water

What stops. None of the three calendars plants these between Jun 1 and Jul 15: arugula, beets, carrots, cauliflower, kale, lettuce, peas, potatoes, radishes, spinach and turnips. Their notes say why. UF/IFAS says hot temperatures make arugula flower and turn bitter, that spinach grows well only in the coolest months and that warm temperatures limit peas. Texas A&M's San Antonio calendar does not recommend head lettuce or standard spinach for spring planting, and UC's Sacramento gardeners call lettuce a cool-season vegetable, sensitive to high temperatures and dry soil.

What keeps going. UF/IFAS calls okra very heat tolerant and Swiss chard an excellent green for warm weather, and plants chard or New Zealand spinach for summer greens; New Zealand and Malabar spinach are not true spinach but grow well in the warm months.

The fall second season

Fall is the second planting season in zone 9, and for most cool-season crops the main one. Across the calendars above, the summer and fall plantings run:

• Broccoli: Jul 1 to Feb 28 (calendars differ)
• Cabbage: Jul 10 to Feb 28 (calendars differ)
• Cauliflower: Aug 11 to Sep 1
• Carrots: Aug 1 to Mar 31 (calendars differ)
• Lettuce: Aug 1 to Mar 31 (calendars differ)
• Spinach: Sep 1 to Jan 31 (calendars differ)
• Beets: Aug 1 to Mar 31 (calendars differ)
• Potatoes: Aug 1 to Sep 10 (calendars differ)
• Tomatoes: Jul 1 to Aug 31 (calendars differ)
• Peppers: Jul 1 to Aug 31 (calendars differ)

Texas A&M's fall guide sets fall tomatoes and peppers out as transplants, never seed. UF/IFAS warns that plantings made in August or September meet the insects and diseases that thrive in hot weather, and says Irish potatoes need cool temperatures.

Shade and water in the heat

• Shade new plantings. Texas A&M grows fall transplants in full sun with shade after 3 p.m., and the AgriLife chart for Houston (Harris County) says seeds and transplants started in the heat of summer benefit from shading until they are established.
• Shade cloth stretches the season. In UF/IFAS trials of hydroponic crops under open shade structures in north Florida, several crops grew through summer under 30 to 45 percent shade cloth; summer tomatoes need "hot set" varieties to set fruit.
• Row cover cools as well as shades. Texas A&M says spunweb row cover runs about 15 F cooler inside than the outside air and shades fall plantings from hot sun.
• Water new transplants daily, then deeply. Texas A&M gives late-summer transplants at least 2 weeks to root and says they may need water every day until then, but too much water is as harmful as too little, so feel the soil first. After that it soaks the soil 6 inches deep; an inch or two a week is usually enough in Texas.
• Mulch and check the top inches. UC's Sacramento gardeners water when the top 1 to 2 inches of soil are dry and mulch to water less often. For summer lettuce they add shade cloth or the shady side of taller crops, and plenty of water.

What to plant this month in zone 9

Month by month, the crops at least one of the three calendars above sows, sets out or plants in that month. Each calendar is written for its own area, so check the table for the one nearest you.

What to plant in January in zone 9

One or more of the calendars plants arugula, beets, broccoli, cabbage, carrots, cauliflower, kale, lettuce, peas, potatoes, radishes, spinach, Swiss chard and turnips in January.

What to plant in February in zone 9

One or more of the calendars plants arugula, beets, broccoli, cabbage, carrots, cauliflower, kale, lettuce, peas, potatoes, radishes, sweet corn, Swiss chard, turnips and winter squash in February.

What to plant in March in zone 9

One or more of the calendars plants arugula, beets, broccoli, cabbage, cantaloupe, carrots, cauliflower, cucumbers, eggplant, lettuce, lima beans, okra, peas, peppers, potatoes, radishes, snap beans, summer squash, sweet corn, Swiss chard, tomatoes, turnips and winter squash in March.

What to plant in April in zone 9

One or more of the calendars plants beets, cantaloupe, carrots, cucumbers, eggplant, lettuce, lima beans, okra, peppers, pumpkins, radishes, snap beans, summer squash, sweet corn, Swiss chard, tomatoes, turnips and winter squash in April.

What to plant in May in zone 9

One or more of the calendars plants cantaloupe, cucumbers, eggplant, lettuce, lima beans, okra, peppers, pumpkins, radishes, snap beans, summer squash, sweet corn, tomatoes, turnips and winter squash in May.

What to plant in June in zone 9

One or more of the calendars plants cantaloupe, cucumbers, eggplant, lima beans, okra, pumpkins, summer squash, sweet corn and winter squash in June.

What to plant in July in zone 9

One or more of the calendars plants broccoli, cabbage, cucumbers, eggplant, lima beans, okra, peppers, pumpkins, snap beans, summer squash, sweet corn, tomatoes and winter squash in July.

What to plant in August in zone 9

One or more of the calendars plants beets, broccoli, cabbage, carrots, cauliflower, cucumbers, lettuce, lima beans, peppers, potatoes, pumpkins, radishes, snap beans, summer squash, sweet corn, Swiss chard, tomatoes, turnips and winter squash in August.

What to plant in September in zone 9

One or more of the calendars plants arugula, beets, broccoli, cabbage, carrots, cauliflower, cucumbers, kale, lettuce, peas, potatoes, radishes, snap beans, spinach, summer squash, Swiss chard, turnips and winter squash in September.

What to plant in October in zone 9

One or more of the calendars plants arugula, beets, broccoli, cabbage, carrots, kale, lettuce, peas, radishes, spinach, Swiss chard and turnips in October.

What to plant in November in zone 9

One or more of the calendars plants arugula, beets, broccoli, cabbage, carrots, kale, lettuce, peas, radishes, spinach, Swiss chard and turnips in November.

What to plant in December in zone 9

One or more of the calendars plants arugula, beets, broccoli, cabbage, carrots, kale, lettuce, peas, radishes, spinach and Swiss chard in December.

How we worked out these dates

• Stations, not the zone, set the frost dates. The 2023 USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map rates places by the average coldest winter night (1991-2020); it says nothing about frost dates. We picked five airports whose ZIPs the USDA map puts in zone 9, both halves of the zone included, and took their NOAA 1991-2020 normal dates for a 32 F night at 50 percent probability.
• One date per zone. The zone date is the median of the five stations: the middle value, so it is a real station's date. Last frost Feb 22 (Sacramento, CA); first frost Dec 7 (Jacksonville, FL).
• Planting windows. Every window on this page is printed in an extension calendar for a zone 9 area: Texas A&M AgriLife (San Antonio), UF/IFAS (north Florida) and the University of California Master Gardener sheet (Sacramento and San Joaquin valleys). We give each as the calendar prints it.
• Ranges and the summer gap. The range column, the month list and the list of crops no calendar plants from Jun 1 to Jul 15 are our count from those windows.
• Why not frost math. Our frost calculator's rules count from frost dates and stop at no summer limit, so in zone 9 they run cool-season crops through the heat and miss the fall and winter seasons. The frost dates above still set the start of spring.
• Your garden. A low spot, a cold spring or a variety with other days to maturity moves these dates. The frost date calculator gives the dates at the NOAA station nearest your ZIP.

More planting guides

• Zone 5 planting schedule
• Zone 6 planting schedule
• Zone 7 planting schedule
• Zone 8 planting schedule
• Brassicas: how to grow kale, cauliflower, turnips and radishes
• Companion planting: what grows well together
• How to grow asparagus, a perennial planted from crowns
• How to grow sprouts indoors, any month of the year
• How to grow onions from seed, sets or transplants
• Frost dates by ZIP code, with a seed-starting calculator

Sources

Every date on this page comes from these sources, read on October 29, 2026.

• NOAA NCEI U.S. Climate Normals, 1991-2020 (freeze dates, 32 F, 50 percent probability)
• USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map, 2023 (Agricultural Research Service; zone of each station's ZIP)
• University of Arkansas Cooperative Extension, Carrots (FSA6064) (heat limit)
• UF/IFAS Extension, Florida Vegetable Gardening Guide (VH021) (extension calendar)
• UF/IFAS Extension, Veggies and Herbs Made in the Shade (HS1228) (summer heat, shade and water notes)
• Texas A&M AgriLife Extension, Bexar County, Recommended Vegetable Varieties for Spring Planting (extension calendar)
• Texas AgriLife Extension, Bexar County, Fall Vegetable Varieties (2008, archived copy) (extension calendar)
• Texas A&M AgriLife Extension, Fall Vegetable Gardening Guide (EHT-056) (summer heat, shade and water notes)
• University of California Master Gardener Program, Grow Your Own Vegetables tip sheet (extension calendar)
• UC Master Gardeners of Sacramento County, Vegetable Gardening 101 (EHN 96) (summer heat, shade and water notes)
• UC Master Gardeners of Sacramento County, Growing Lettuce in Warm Weather (summer heat, shade and water notes)
• Texas AgriLife Extension, Harris County, Vegetable Garden Planting Dates (summer heat, shade and water notes)

Frequently asked questions

When should I plant tomatoes in zone 9?

Twice: in spring, and in midsummer for a fall crop. Texas A&M's San Antonio calendar sets tomato transplants out Mar 15 to May 10 and again Jul 1 to Jul 25, and UF/IFAS plants north Florida tomatoes late Mar to Apr and in August. Texas A&M's fall guide uses transplants, not seed, for fall tomatoes.

When should I plant potatoes in zone 9?

Plant seed potatoes in late winter. Texas A&M's San Antonio calendar plants seed pieces Feb 1 to Mar 1, UF/IFAS plants north Florida potatoes Jan to Mar and UC's Sacramento valley sheet Feb to Mar. San Antonio adds a fall planting Aug 20 to Sep 10; UF/IFAS says Irish potatoes need cool temperatures.

What can I plant in fall in zone 9?

Most cool-season crops: fall is their main season in zone 9. Texas A&M's San Antonio calendar sows broccoli Aug 20 to Sep 10 and carrots and lettuce Aug 20 to Oct 10. UF/IFAS plants north Florida broccoli, cabbage and kale Sep to Feb, and UC's Sacramento sheet plants spinach and peas Sep to Jan.

Can I sow vegetables in winter in zone 9?

Yes, many cool-season crops. UF/IFAS plants north Florida carrots, beets and radishes Sep to Mar and Irish potatoes Jan to Mar. UC's Sacramento valley sheet plants lettuce Nov to Mar and broccoli Dec to Feb, and Texas A&M's San Antonio calendar sows peas Jan 1 to Feb 15.

When should I plant carrots in zone 9?

Sow carrots from late summer into winter, and again in late winter. UF/IFAS sows north Florida carrots Sep to Mar; Texas A&M's San Antonio calendar Aug 20 to Oct 10 and Feb 1 to Mar 1; UC's Sacramento sheet Aug to Sep and Feb to Apr. Arkansas Extension wants carrots to mature where temperatures average under 80 F.