Growing Sweet Peas

I love to cut sweet peas for their beauty and the delicious scent they produce but do not eat them by any means because they are poisonous. Not only is the flower lovely but the greens can be used by themselves in other arrangements to add a bit of contrast and texture. I've wanted to be a sweet pea grower for most of my adult life but I must admit that until about 4 year ago I had no idea how to get them to germinate. I had tried them a few times back 20 years or so ago and just thought I didn't know what I was doing or they were just too hard to grow. Boy, was I wrong.

My love with sweet peas began way back when I was just a little girl strolling around my great-grandmother Mable's yard. She was an avid gardener and we spent many visits in the spring, summer, and fall in her flower gardens. I visited often as we just lived a house over and my grandfather (her son George) had mowed a grass path down to her house so it really made it easy for me to visit. She had so many flowers but it was the sweet sweet fragrance of these beauties that made me fall in love with them first.

Now it would have helped my growing expertise if I had only noticed what time of year her sweet peas bloomed but of course I didn't. Sometime after she passed away I went to her house hoping to catch her sweet peas blooming so I could lift some out of the soil and take with me. But of course I did not find them.

About 4 years ago I learned that sweet peas were cool season plants. Meaning they germinate and bloom when our seasons are warming and cool like spring (you could probably get them to grow in fall too if you time it just right but it would definately take some experimentation). They usually finish blooming late May or early June unless you have them in some shade. They really can't take the hot summer weather but certain varieties do better than others.

So as I was learning about sweet peas a few years ago I learned that I was horrible at watering and the water is what was needed to break the seed coat down so the little baby plant inside could start to grow. I found one website that recommended soaking them in water for 24 hours to help speed up the germination process. This seemed to work so I did that every year when I started them. I have since learned it is not necessary but some people prefer this method and that's ok too. This year I germinated them inside the house in my basement grow room without soaking. Our basement grow room stays about 65-70 degrees. Usually the soil will be about 10 degrees cooler than that room temp. So this year I just placed them on the grow shelf to germinate-no heat mat either.

We planted them up in a 50 cell tray full of wet potting mix. The mix wasn't soaking wet but it was generously moist. I planted 1-2 seeds per cell and planted them 1/2 -1 in deep and made sure soil covered them as sweet peas prefer dark to germinate. I popped a plastic dome over the seed tray to help hold in humidity as that is vital to getting that seed coat to break down to encourage germination. At the temps previously mentioned, it only took 5 days or so to spot little seedlings shooting out of the soil. At that point I pulled the humidity dome off and sat them under my grow lights to start their little green life.

A couple of week after germination I start fertilizing them with a light organic fertilizer made from fish emulsion-and let me tell you it stinks! But it does provide great food for small frequent doses to get those sweeties off to a good start. My goal is to feed them every couple of weeks. Once they are about 6-10 inches tall I give them a pinch (a cut back to the 2nd or 3rd leaf node) to encourage them to branch and send out strong shoots for those long beautiful flower stems in their future.

This week I started weaning them outside in hopes to plant them out next weekend to start their new life inside our high tunnel-sweet peas are equiped to handle the cold temps-many people without grow rooms will seed them in fall and they germinate and live as tiny plants until spring warms up(sometimes you have to cover them during the winter too-just depends on the variety and how hardy they are in the cold). Since I plant mine in the high tunnel they will have warmer temps and covers to protect them from whatever the rest of winter holds. Before I tuck them in a will add a nice layer of compost and a general organic fertilizer and then every other week add some fish emulsion fertilizer until they get growing well-I try to cut off the fish emulsion well before blooming so the stinky fishy smell is not completing with their normal sweet fragrance.

We add tposts close to planting with netting for them to climb up as well as drip lines because they are ferocious drinkers. As they make their way up the netting sometimes we have to tie them up to keep them out of the rows as they will be walked all over and ruin their soon to be blooms. I usually start cutting them for cut flowers when they are 4-6 ft tall. I usually cut the blooms off as they bloom though regardless of what height they have gotten to. Sweet peas are cut and come again flowers so the more you cut them the more they bloom.

As they get worn out from blooming, their leaves will start to yellow and you can watch the flowers turn to seed pods and that begins even more fun-the fun of saving your own seeds for the next year. Sweet pea seeds are self pollinating-that means that they can fertilize themselves with their own pollen without having to be pollinated by a bee or the wind or other process. That also means that the seeds are usually true to the plant they came from-next years blooms will look like the past years blooms. It's a cheap way to have seeds for next year and also have more seeds if you have a hard to get variety-some sources I order from limit seed ordering to 1 packet for the seeds that are harder to find because they are so scarce.

Sweet peas are such a nostalgic flower for so many people. If you haven't yet tried to grow them I think you will be quite happily surprised if you do. As always send a message if you have a question about growing-I would love to help!. Some of my favority varieties-Nimbus, Bix, Crimson Kiss, Mollie Rilstone, and America. But my list is growing! If you have a favorite variety, please share in comments.