Lesson 7: Vegetable Gardening
Peas And Beans
If you have never tasted home-grown beans or peas, you’re in for a surprise. They bear little resemblance to the products found in stores. Good home-grown peas are so sweet you can eat them right out of the pod. Snow peas have a crisp and appealing texture and flavor that you just can’t match.
In order to get both peas and beans off to a good start, the soil needs to be prepared and an inoculant added. This helps produce strong, healthy plants and introduces the beneficial microbes into the soil that these vegetables require for producing good harvests. All peas like good well-drained soil. Digging in a little compost and peat are really all they need to get growing.
English peas are a cool-weather crop and should be planted early. In the lower South they are grown all seasons except summer; farther north, they are grown in spring and autumn. In the Northern States and at high altitudes, they may be grown from spring until autumn, although in many places summer heat is too severe and the season is practically limited to Spring. A few successive plantings may be made at 10-day intervals. The later plantings rarely yield as well as the earlier ones. Planting may be resumed as the cool weather of autumn approaches, but the yield is seldom as satisfactory as that from the spring planting. Some smooth-seeded varieties are frequently used for planting in the early spring because of the supposition that they can germinate well in cold, wet soil. Peas grown on supports are less liable to destruction by birds.
Sugar peas (edible podded peas) possess the tenderness and fleshy podded qualities of snap beans and the flavor and sweetness of fresh English peas. When young, the pods are cooked like snap beans; the peas are not shelled. At this stage, pods are stringless, brittle, succulent, and free of fiber or parchment. However, if the pods develop too fast, they are not good to use like snap beans, but the seeds may be eaten as shelled peas and are of the best flavor before they have reached full size.
Green beans, both snap and lima, are more important than dry beans to the home gardener. Snap beans cannot be planted until the ground is thoroughly warm, but succession plantings may be made every 2 weeks from that time until 7 or 8 weeks before frost. In the lower South and Southwest, green beans may be grown during the fall, winter, and spring, but they are not well adapted to midsummer. In the extreme South, beans are grown throughout the winter. Green beans are adapted to a wide range of soils as long as the soils are well drained, reasonably fertile, and of such physical nature that they do not interfere with germination and emergence of the plants. Soil that has received a general application of manure and fertilizer should need no additional fertilization. When beans follow early crops that have been fertilized, the residue of this fertilizer is often sufficient for the beans.
Both pole beans and peas need support. Using a plant teepee, a fence or trellis, gives them a place to climb and provides an easy access for harvesting. Bush beans can be grown in rows. Once beans begin to mature, harvesting should be done every other day.
Both peas and beans freeze well. Have a pot of boiling water ready. Fill the sink with ice cubes. After harvesting, wash the vegetables and place in a strainer. Dunk in the rapidly boiling water, 30 seconds for peas, and 1 minute for beans. Immediately plunge them into the cold water for another 30 seconds to one minute and place in freezer bags. This is a simple and easy way to make good use of these wonderful vegetables.
Topic of Discussion: Have you ever grown peas or beans? How successful were you?
