Disappointment and Enlightenment

Ok, so my pea fortress has been successful, but it also clued me in to the real problem. Of the approxiamtely one jillion peas I planted (ok, probably more like 200. Not certain. Order of magnitude, anyway.) just 10 plants came up. Based on what I've since read, the most likely culprit for my absence of peas is probably the seeds rotting. Apparently if you plant them too early, they rot rather than sprouting. To work around this, presprout them in wet paper towels. Not airtight, leads to premature mold. Tried this and wow, now I have some peas sprouting. It might be a bit late for an amazing harvest, sadly. But next year, with the knowledge I've gained and the cages already set up, I should do well. Just a note, in the past I've gotten no peas sprouted, I think this was a mix of mostly rotting and the stragglers power-chowed by the groundhog. My old nemesis.

Other stuff - My first planting of seedlings went poorly. Only the San Marzano tomatoes survived. But they're doing well. Basil is coming up nicely. Second planting of eggplant, ground cherries, tomatoes (incl cherry tomatoes), and peppers. Planted zucchini last weekend in the community garden. Kale in the community garden survived the winter and is doing great - rest of the grean leafies died. I couldn't tell the difference between them much, I think I'll stick with kale.

Peas

My history with peas has been more than a little rocky. First I grew regular peas and found that despite having lots of pea plants the return was just awful. Like a giant bowl full of pea pods would generate enough peas for a medium serving of peas for me. Lame!

So I decided to go all in on sugar snap peas. I had a season or two of happiness with them, but I always felt like I didn't get enough of them. We would have them with 5 or 6 meals, but then none to freeze, none to share. Then I entered the black hole of peas. The last three or four years I've either not planted any or not gotten any. Like, not any. I'm not sure if it's the woodchuck or the deer or the rabbits, but the plants are just disappearing.

So this year I built them a fortress. A castle. A stronghold. Forged from the mighty chicken wire left over from the giant tomato cage in the back yard, I built a crude structure over the peas. Certainly good enough to keep out rabbits. Not sure with woodchucks, but probably. Also doubles as support once the peas grow a little higher. And I planted quite a lot of them. Both in the small strip off the back deck and the longer strip on the side. Clearing the beds took some time and effort. But if I get a bumper crop of peas, I'll be amply rewarded.

Side "yard" planting

Backyard strip planting

Mal needs cash, so he has offered to clean up the rock garden. Once a huge bed of flowers, chives, and strawberries, seasons of neglect have left it full of weeds and even some saplings. If he can get it cleared out, I may try growing a ton of basil in there. May also try to get the strawberries up and running again. I bought some seeds. We'll see how those work out.

Bonus daffodil. Also gives some hint of the brush that fills the rock garden.

Getting the chicken wire gave me a clue how much of a mess the fenced in garden has gotten to be. I will clean it out a bit, I do want to get green beans going back there. If I had a nice couple beds of green beans, I could probably get enough to freeze, that would be sweet.

Peatopia

1 lb, 14 oz of peas picked today. That brings the grand total to 3 lbs, 3 oz. Half a pound is good for a meal for us. We popped 1 pound of them in the freezer for later. Jill suggested Thanksgiving, I'm not sure they'll still be tasty by then.

The garlic harvest is in and slowly drying. This is just the storebought softneck garlic crop. The hardneck has a ways to go. We gave away a few and ate a few already. I think we'll plant some more next year.

Tomatoes are growing. Not too big yet.

Peas in Bloom

A quick count found 71 flowers on the Sugar Snap Sprint along with maybe half a dozen pea pods in various states of growth. In comparison, the Sugar Snap have four flowers at this point. The Sugar Snap are much taller than the Sprint though. I wonder if they'll produce more peas in total.

The Three Sisters garden is ready. We've got a grid of 3 x 5 mounds and we planted the corn today in each of the circled mounds.

A larger scale view of the garden, with the pavers and raised beds. Flourishing potatoes hogging the camera.

Also got a first taste of Sugar Snap Sprint peas. Pretty tasty, even the boys liked it.