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Gardening

Sweet peas

(13 Posts)
Luckygirl Sun 02-Sep-18 17:19:49

I have achieved a lifetime's ambition this year and grown lots of sweet peas - two obelisks which are flowering like mad!

I am picking them like mad too and have 4 vases of them in the house at the moment!

Should I leave some to go to seed and use them next year, or is it better to just buy seed next year?

winterwhite Sun 02-Sep-18 17:26:29

Your name says it all Luckygirl. How satisfying. Re seed, I'd do a bit of both, then maybe you can develop your own variety the year after. grin

Luckygirl Sun 02-Sep-18 17:45:03

Or be on Gardener's World!!!! grin

Hilltopgran Sun 02-Sep-18 18:17:26

Well done, I grew mine from seed this year, they were great for about a month then the dry ground affected them, however a couple of plants are looking good again. If you have managed to grow them in this very dry summer you might need to give them more drainage in a wet year. At this time of year they form seed pods very easily, the difficulty is to make sure you collect from a range of colours!

BlueBelle Sun 02-Sep-18 18:33:39

I ve got loads of seeds but when do we put them in do you put them now as if the flower burst and dropped it itself or do you wait and put them in in the Spring .... thanks

merlotgran Sun 02-Sep-18 19:02:59

I sow some now in modules made from toilet roll middles and overwinter them in the greenhouse then I sow some more in the spring - same method. I don't sow them directly into the ground because we're surrounded by farmland and mice love 'em.

BlueBelle Sun 02-Sep-18 19:21:32

Thank you merlotgran I think I ll just put them in in the spring as I don’t have much indoor space to start them off x

Jalima1108 Sun 02-Sep-18 20:14:22

Ours have done well for the first time too; however, I have been a bit lax about picking them lately and they have all reverted to mid-pink.

midgey Sun 02-Sep-18 20:21:14

I am very jealous, mine were complete rubbish this year. Most of my garden is still a frazzled dried up mess, oh for some rain!

travelsafar Mon 03-Sep-18 08:27:51

I heard somewhere that the seeds need to be soaked in water first and a small nick made in them or is that edible peas. ?

tiredoldwoman Mon 03-Sep-18 09:32:04

Midgey , mine are rubbish too . Lots of leggy growth , very small flower buds but they've never opened ! Last year they were super .

Iam64 Mon 03-Sep-18 09:59:31

Mine are no good this year, hardly any flowers, it must be the drought and heat.
The perennial sweat peas were fantastic though

Grammaretto Mon 03-Sep-18 10:37:16

Mine were/are great this year. Here in Scotland we didn't have such a hot summer but it was perfect for sweet peas. I haven't tried seed saving but may now. Thanks for the suggestion.
I bought organic seed so I don't know if that makes a difference. I was told that F1 hybrids won't come up true in the next year. As long as they retain their scent who cares about the colours!
I grew them up our last year's Christmas tree which had lost its needles. It worked well .