budded fall peas

I've tried for the past 10 years to get a fall crop of peas and haven't been successful. Our weather goes from hot to frost too fast. But I've got my fingers crossed this year. Maybe.... My pea plants are budded and our weather is pretty nice, with nights not going much below 50 F yet. Our season generally seems about 2 weeks late this year. So maybe 2 or 3 weeks until frost. Maybe enough time for these peas.

I started spouting these peas (Burpeeana Early, 63 days to harvest) on August 8 indoors in paper towels and then planted them outside a week later. The weather was so hot that I planted them next to my popcorn for afternoon shade. I also planted Johnny's Sugar Snap peas at the same time but they have not done well probably since they had no shade.

sowing peas

I planted peas yesterday. The soil was nicely thawed and has been thawed for over a week now. I turned it a couple weeks ago, but it froze up soon after that. It thawed again soon after. It's drained well now and certainly workable.

I plant peas by digging a trench about an inch deep and 6 inches wide. I scattered in the peas. (I didn't have inoculant and will add some to the soil as soon as I find some. It's new soil and I want to be sure the nitrogen fixing bacterial are there.) I scatter the pea seeds fairly dense. They can hold each other up this way. I left space between the rows for another planting in a couple weeks.

Grow peas, grow!