Wednesday, April 6, 2011

A little late on the Sweet Peas

I usually boldly plant my sweet pea seeds March 1st or so. Yes, you read correctly: Here, in my zone 5a garden, I plant seeds, outside, in the freezing snow and cold, in March. I plant lettuce and garden peas then, too, and have incredible yields. I never protect them, and they always thrive. I urge you to try it!! This year, I did the usual hoarding of sweet pea varieties when the seed packets hit the store shelves, but it ocured to me that I won't be living here by the time they bloom... so I hesistated to plant them all. I know May 30th, when we arrive at our new house in Minnesota it will be too late to plant sweet peas, so I just stared at the packets trying to decide what to do. This week I made a decision. Containers it is. So a few nights ago I soaked my seeds overnight, tucking the plant labels I made under the cups so as not to confuse the varieties. I have 6 or so varieties here. I put one packet in the ground for our home buyers to enjoy on the trellises on the back of the garage (I will be taking the clematis from there, so I thought I'd leave something pretty to look at). I bought these uber-cheap pots from Walmart and put one packet in each one- I plan on adding some little bamboo sticks tied into tripods with jute for them to grow on. the pots are on my back porch in the cold now. I just have to stay on top of the moisture- sweet peas do not like to dry out. Hopefully, when garden move day comes, I'm able to just throw these in the truck, and take em' right along with me. You can bet there will be pictures of the madness then! Happy gardening!

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