Few annual flowers have the lasting appeal and bucolic beauty of sweet peas. Twining lazily around a rustic trellis, they seem the very antithesis of our busy lives. With their seductive fragrance, sweet peas make great flowers for gardens and bouquets. See our Sweet Pea Growing Guide for information on how to plant and care for sweet peas!
The sweet pea—Lathyrus odoratus—is an annual flower that is at home in a cutting garden, border garden, woodland, or twining on a trellis or an arch. The flowers are now available in a huge range of colors, from pearly white through ice cream pastels to ritzy magentas and inky purples.
Their dainty winged blossoms are matched only by their honey and orange blossom perfume. The combination of the delightful scent and the ability to produce so many blooms for the house over a long period of cutting has ensured their popularity.
Early sowing is one of the secrets to growing sweet peas! Despite their delicate look, sweet peas are quite hardy. In Zone 7 or colder, plant them in very late winter or early spring as soon as the soil is dry enough to work. (Do not wait to sow until last frost.)
The first sweet peas were introduced to Britain in 1699 when a Sicilian monk, Francis Cupani, sent seeds of this highly fragrant annual to Dr Robert Uvedale, a teacher from Enfield, Middlesex. They became hugely popular in North America, both as garden plants and cut flowers. By the late 1800s, California’s growers (including W. Atlee Burpee) shipped trainloads of sweet peas all over the country and developed many further varieties.
Some folks say that growing sweet peas is akin to making a pie crust. Some people have the knack, others don't. This plant grows from large, easy-to-handle, pea-like seeds. Still, they're a bit tricky because they are slow to germinate. It's worth experimenting with different seeds each year.
Image: Easy-to-handle sweet pea seeds.
Video: We'll show you how to plant sweet peas in this video demonstration.
Care
There are sweet pea varieties for every situation, from 8-foot-plus scramblers to dwarf bedding ones suitable for containers and borders without support.
In their native Sicily, these ornamental peas have weak stems and an intense orange-jasmine-honey scent. Modern hybrids are stronger-stalked and have larger blooms.
At the same time, some of these modern varieties with larger flowers and contemporary hues lack the fragrance of the earlier sweet peas. Sweet pea 'Cupani', with it’s bi-colored flowers, maroon upper petals with violet “wings,” is still deservedly popular and is easy to grow.
The deliciously-scented 'America' is an heirloom, dating to 1896. Its petals unfurl to show stunning wavy red and white stripes.
Look for heirlooms like the 'Old Spice' collection from Sicily. This strain blooms in shades of white, cream, pink, lavender, and purple.
'April in Paris' is a fragrant modern variety with large creamy-yellow blossoms and lilac shading.
While the common sweet pea is an annual, there is also a perennial unscented broad-leaved everlasting pea, Lathyrus latiflolius. These are clambering plants, which can reach up to 6 or 7 feet and hardy to zone 5; they are low maintenance plants that flower regularly year on year.
"The odor of the sweet pea is so offensive to flies that it will drive them out of a sick-room, though not in the slightest degree disagreeable to the patient."
–A tip from The 1899 Old Farmer's Almanac
Sweet Pea
(Delicate Pleasures)
"Here are sweet peas, on tip-toe for a flight:
With wings of gentle flush o'er delicate white,
And taper fingers catching at all things,
To bind them all about with tiny rings."
–John Keats (1795–1821)
Sweet potatoes in 100 days! Sweet potatoes started from slips–rooted sprouts–purchased at the garden center or from a seed catalog can be harvested in about 100 days, even less. Short-season sweet potato varieties include ‘Beauregard’, ‘Centennial’, and ‘Georgia Jet.’ These three planted from slips will be ready for harvest in 80 to 90 days. Varieties that can be harvested or lifted in about 100 to 110 days are ‘Bush Porto R
The Southern pea is a warm-weather annual that will tolerate no frost. Southern peas are also called blackeyed peas, crowder peas, and yard-long beans. Southern peas are sometimes called cowpeas or field peas. Sow Southern peas in the garden 4 weeks after the last average frost date in spring. For an early start, sow Southern peas indoors 6 weeks before you plan to transplant them into the garden. Sow succession crops every 2 weeks. Southern peas require 60 to 90 days to reach
Sweet potatoes are tender, warm-season perennial plants grown as annuals. Sweet potatoes require a long, warm growing season, usually about 4 months of frost-free weather to reach harvest. Set sweet potato starts or slips in the garden after all danger of frost has passed, usually 4 weeks after the last average frost date in early summer. Sweet potatoes grow best where the air temperature remains very warm, from 75° to 95°F (24-35°C) throughout the growing season. Sweet potato
Garden peas and snap peas are grown for their shelled seeds or peas in their pods. Snow peas are grown for their flat, green pods. • Peas are a cool-season crop that must mature before the weather gets warm. The ideal growing temperature for peas is 55°F to 70°F (13-21°C). • Sow peas in the garden 6 weeks before the average last frost date in spring or as soon as the soil can be worked. About Peas. Peas are weak-stemmed vining annuals with leaf-like stipules, leaves with one to