Vegetable Gardening (46 page)

‘Super Sugar Snap':
These vines grow to 6 feet tall, producing tons of sweet, long pods and peas 65 days after planting. This variety is shorter and more disease resistant than the original ‘Sugar Snap', which is still available.

An earlier harvest: Snow peas

If you've eaten a vegetable dish in a Chinese restaurant, you've probably tried these sweet-tasting, flat-podded peas. Snow peas are the easiest peas to grow because you don't have to wait for the pea pods to fill out to harvest them. They're tender, stringless, and best when harvested before the peas inside begin to swell. Here are some of the best producing varieties to try:

‘Dwarf Gray Sugar':
This viny, 2- to 3-foot-tall plant needs support but produces 3-inch, dark green pods 57 days after planting. The pink flowers this plant produces are ornamental, so you'll enjoy how they dress up your garden.

‘Golden Sweet':
This Indian heirloom features unique golden-colored pods on 6-foot-tall green vines that mature in 65 days. The pods stay golden when cooked, making them beautiful additions to stir-fry and salads.

‘Mammoth Melting Sugar':
This 4- to 5-foot-tall heirloom features 5-inch-long pods that stay sweet longer than other varieties. It matures in 68 days after planting.

‘Oregon Giant':
These large 4- to 5-inch sweet pods grow on disease-resistant, 3-foot-tall vines 60 days after planting.

‘Oregon Sugar Pod II':
Another large-podded, sweet-tasting snow pea, this variety grows to 4 feet tall and matures its pods 68 days after planting. Like ‘Oregon Giant', it's also disease resistant.

Get 'Em in the Ground: Growing Beans and Peas

Peas and beans are like siblings: They have a lot in common but also have some different preferences. For instance, both peas and beans like moderate moisture throughout the growing season and well-drained soil that isn't heavily
amended
(nutrient-improved) with fertilizer. And neither is very demanding at all. The fundamental difference between pea and beans, however, is that peas like cool climates and beans prefer warm ones. If you get the timing right — by planting peas so they mature when it's cool and beans when it's hot — these two siblings will reward you with a bounty of legumes.

Planting legumes for an ample harvest

When planting legumes, choose a sunny spot with well-drained soil and create a raised bed (see Chapter 3). Raised beds help keep pea seeds from getting soggy while they germinate in cool spring soil; at the same time, raised beds also warm up the soil for bean seeds, which you plant in late spring and summer. In the following sections, I explain how to prepare the soil for your legumes, figure out when to plant, and discover how to give them the proper support.

Preparing the soil

Plants need nitrogen to grow, and most of the time they get it from the soil. Legumes are unique, however, in that they can use the nitrogen in the air through a special relationship with a type of bacteria called a
rhizobium.
This bacteria naturally occurs in soil and attaches itself to legume roots, living off the plants. In exchange, the bacteria takes the atmospheric nitrogen and changes it into a form that the plants can use. Beans and peas get the nitrogen they need, and the bacteria gets a home. So don't worry about adding more nitrogen fertilizer to legumes; they can take care of themselves. If you see bumps or nodules on the roots of your plants, you know that bacteria is at work.

Books and catalogs often suggest that you buy your own bacteria inoculant powder to add to bean and pea seeds when planting. This powder really isn't necessary. Soil already has bacteria in it, so usually you don't need to add any extra to your seeds. The exception, however, is with very sandy or poor soil. These types of soil need a one-time
inoculation
(the mixing of powder with seeds at planting), which peppers the soil with bacteria and gives plants the boost they need. After the rhizobium is in the soil, you don't need to add it yearly.

Even though legumes don't need extra nitrogen, they benefit from a 2- to 3-inch layer of composted manure worked into the soil before planting. For poor soils with low fertility, add an organic fertilizer high in phosphorous and potassium, such as 5-5-5 (see Chapter 15).

Determining when to plant

With beans, wait until the soil is at least 60 degrees Fahrenheit before planting. Beans planted in cool soil rot before germinating. Stagger your bush bean planting dates by planting small batches of seeds every week or so (see Chapter 16 for more on succession planting). By staggering the plantings, you'll have a continual harvest all summer.

Peas like cool soil; in fact, they can germinate in 40-degree soil. As soon as the soil dries out, build your raised beds and plant your seeds. You can determine whether your soil is dried out by squeezing a handful of it; if no water trickles out and the soil clump feels moist and breaks up easily when poked with your finger, the soil is dried out.

You can plant peas 3 to 4 weeks before the last frost date in your area if the soil is ready. Pea seeds germinate better in 60- to 70-degree soil, but if you wait until the soil is warmer, the plants will get off to a late start. By the time the peas would begin flowering, the air temperature would be too warm (above 80 degrees), and your plants and production would suffer.