Plant Peas in Zone 10a

Zone 10a averages 323 frost-free days, running from a last spring frost around January 31 to a first fall frost around December 20. Peas needs roughly 60 days from planting out to first harvest, so it uses about 19 percent of that window. Peas is a hardy crop, which is what decides where in the window it belongs.

Peas handles cold soil, so there is no reason to wait for the frost date. Direct sow around Dec 27, roughly 5 weeks before the Zone 10a last frost, as soon as the ground is workable. Sowing at the last frost instead costs you the coolest and best part of the season. At 60 days to harvest, a 323-day Zone 10a season has room for about 4 sowings, so stagger them rather than planting everything at once.

Yes. Sow peas by October 21 in Zone 10a. That is 60 days before the average first frost, which covers the 60 days to maturity plus about two weeks for the slower growth that comes with shortening days, minus the roughly 14 days peas keeps going once light frost arrives.

Fall peas have to be sown into the heat of late summer and germinate poorly above 80 degrees, which is why they fail more often than spring peas. Sow thickly and keep the seedbed damp.