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Sweet Peas at Sugar Moon Gardens
Last year I grew ~10 different kinds of sweet peas, I lined them all up in a nice 20-foot row, planted on either side of netting and they were beautiful and smelled amazing. In late summer seed pods were forming - myself and my friend Angie madly labeled each plat at the ground level - what a pain… then came trying to harvest seeds and keep them separate. They all look the same. You can imagine. I didn't sell any sweet peas last year, because I couldn't guarantee the varieties.
Lesson learned.
This year I put up "sweet pea cages" at the end of each of my rows - 14 all up. Each cage has a separate sweet pea variety; this is so much easier.
I've been doing a deep dive into Sweet peas, and bought these books - I they are reference guides and historical books, with tons of info. So, if you like to garden geek out, like I do - I recommend these:
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Sweet peas self-pollinate. By the time the flower opens it's already pollinated - the bees don't really help it along. In order to create a new sweet pea, you have to open it up before it blooms, pollinate with an already open flower (protected so no pollen contamination from bees). Wait for it to form seeds then grow it out next year. Then 2-3 years later hopefully the plant has genetically settled down, and then you can grow it out for volume to sell. Lots of time and labor.
New sweet peas are available each year - a new one was introduced at the RHS Chelsea flower show this year called "Shell Pink" from Dr. Keith Hammett (New Zealand) - this will be a very hard to find variety - already sold out in the UK. To ship from the UK, I would need to find a seller willing to do Phyto-certification, no shipping from Dr. Keith Hammet in New Zealand… so crossing my fingers.
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