Kitchen Garden Forum

Can anyone suggest a decent early pea that I can sow every fortnight or so for succession that doesnt need too much support and keeps to 3 foot or so.

Piglet

Kelvedon Wonder are fine and grow to about 2 - 2 1/2 feet.

these were the ones i tried last year and didn't have much sucsess,but the years befor were wonderful.mabe i just did't talk to them enough .

Kelvedon Wonder is probably the best bet as Jenny says however Fortune can give earlier crops and Early Onward is a good bet too.
You could start sowing them now indoors and transplant in three weeks under a plastic sheet.
This has worked for me for the past 6 years in the chilly North East.
Good Luck !

The Simply Vegetables catalogue from Seeds of Distinction lists a variety called Half Pint. We got a free packet with our order last year. At only 12-15" tall, it is suitable for container growing. We grew ours in containers in the greenhouse last year.

They are fine for an early crop, in containers indoors but at £1.25 for a packet of 30 seeds, are a bit too dear for succession sowing.

valmarg

Hello Piglet
I've found 'Cavalier' to be reliable and a good tasty cropper. You can sow it from about March onwards - its not one of the really early round seeded types though. It has good resistance to mildew, which can be a problem with peas sown later in the season.
It gets up to about 3 feet high.
John

Can I have that name for my new TV show.

We take gardeners home video, pad it out with flashy shots of soil, slugs, fast moving lettuce plants etc and show "When Good Peas Go Wrong !"

Fame at last piglet

Kevin

most peas are as hard as nails but its there early maturing ability you ought to be after, have a look at the back of the packet for this info . i had a plug tray of feltham first freeze twice before i planted them into the tunnel border last year . a sowing of the same germinated under fleece and survived to crop outdoors .to get really early peas try a sowing in october or november but keep them protected. as for a constant crop i make 4 sowings a year 4 weeks apart starting with feltham then either kelvedon wonder or onward and the final sowing with hurst greenshaft

thanks for that Darren, I will follow your lead, any probs with pea moth though.

Hi there i find the best way to start off peas to get an early crop is to grow them in strips of guttering started in the greenhouse. when they are ready to plant out just hoe a furrow where you want to grow them, water the guttering well and you can push/slide the peas like a snake into the furrow.