Cape gooseberry · Chengdu, Sichuan, China
When to plant cape gooseberries in Chengdu
Main outdoor window
28 Feb - 21 Mar
The window this page is built around.
Timed from last spring frost
14 February
In Chengdu, on your chosen risk.
Ready to pick
1 Aug - 31 Oct
If you plant at the start of the window.
The average last frost. Half of all years are later than this.
Step by step in Chengdu
Each window is a range, not a single day. Earlier in the range buys you a longer season; later in it buys you a safer one.
Start indoors
19 Dec - 10 Jan
Eight weeks before your last frost, under cover or on a windowsill.
Plant out
28 Feb - 21 Mar
Two weeks after your last frost.
Harvest
1 Aug - 31 Oct
Cape gooseberries through the year
Against the frost risk in Chengdu
Why these dates
Start indoors 8 weeks before the last frost and plant out after it, exactly as for tomatoes. In a frost-free climate it persists for several years and fruits far more heavily in its second.
Killed by the first real frost where it is grown as an annual, which is what ends the season rather than any decision of the gardener's.
Seed packets and extension guides express timing as weeks either side of the last spring frost, because that is the only reference point that travels. Cape gooseberries are timed from 8 weeks before that frost for an indoor start, with planting out 2 weeks after it, and this page simply resolves those offsets against the frost date computed for Chengdu.
Hardiness is not the obstacle here. Chengdu is zone 9b, comfortably inside the range this crop is rated for, so an established plant should come through an average winter without protection.
The median frost-free season here is 300 days, against 100 to 130 days to maturity for this crop counted from planting out. That margin is what decides whether a late sowing is worth attempting.
Also in Chengdu
Other fruits to time
Growing cape gooseberries in Chengdu
When should I plant cape gooseberries in Chengdu?
Aim for 28 Feb - 21 Mar in an average year. If you would rather not gamble on the weather, wait until 20 Mar - 10 Apr - by then frost has finished in nine years out of ten.
When will cape gooseberries be ready to harvest in Chengdu?
Expect to start picking around 1 Aug - 31 Oct, based on 100 to 130 days to maturity from the planting date calculated for this location.
How much frost will cape gooseberries tolerate?
Killed by the first real frost where it is grown as an annual, which is what ends the season rather than any decision of the gardener's.