Nope, I still hate peas!

[Millymollymandy]

Ah but - that's only fertilising with nitrogen and plants want other things too. I did leave the roots of the runner beans in place last year until the plot got dug over but how do you know how much nitrogen they are fixing, how do you tell? I can't really remember what bean like thing was where from the previous year to remember not to fertilise in that particular spot or only use a non nitrogen fertiliser, that's way too complicated! And does the nitrogen last all through the winter rains or is it only there whilst the roots are there?

I just fertilise once in the spring before planting and that's it, a lot simpler.

[Christine]

very exposed and windy in my veg patch so I wonder if they'd be blowing about a bit. Trouble is I'm never sure which way the wind will blow - this year so far it's nearly all north winds but the last two I've been staking up all my plants against SW winds!

Just reading your problems with peas (mine are about two inches high - the wood pigeons had them before I plugged all gaps with string cats' cradle) but I thought I'd pass on a tip from an allotment neighbour, which might help with the yellowing too (it would have helped with the pigeon if only I'd had the tip earlier...)
He loves peas and sows them direct, packed close in a square block with a long pole at each corner. He covers the bed with a sheet of fleece, which seems to deter the mice, and then wraps a sheet of fleece round the poles, completely surrounding the peas as they grow. He reckons it defeats the pidge and keeps the peas cool and shaded, while pollinating insects don't seem to have trouble getting at the flowers. He has bumper crops, so I guess he's right!

By the way, why don't you pick and eat the pea shoots, instead? v tasty

[Millymollymandy]

Hi Christine, I did sow a pot of peas just for the shoots which we ate and the plants are sitting there going rather yellow as I was interested to see whether they would continue to grow and flower and have peas - but it's too hot now and they are packed into a smallish pot.

I've got shade cloth covering my transplanted lettuces which is working so probably would work on the peas/mange tout as well, but the last sowing of peas are getting crinkly shells before they've even got mature peas inside - oh well I need the space for other things.

But this year is so dry that it's not surprising that things are going yellow prematurely as I can't keep up with the watering.

[Odsox]

Ah but - that's only fertilising with nitrogen and plants want other things too.

Just an observation and not a criticism but if you follow crop rotation then brassicas should follow legumes which of course need more nitrogen that other plants. Clever eh ?
If your soil is acid side of neutral it will need lime for brassicas and you should never apply lime at the same time as nitrogen based fertiliser as the two react and produce ammonia, which of course is a gas, which escapes to the atmosphere ... hence wasting your time and money and resulting in no extra nitrogen in your soil.
Nitrogen in legume nodules is released slowly as the root decompose and is not affected by liming.

Sorry about that, you caught me when my brain was sort of actually working.

[Millymollymandy]

Well that's interesting. I don't 'do' brassicas much because of flea beetle, so only grow PSB and curly kale which I put in after the spuds come out although they used to go in the bed with the sweetcorn but there's no room any more. Anyway discovered that as the spuds are followed by things which go in much later in the season I could leave my kale to flower and get the edible shoots from it instead of having to dig it up in March/April.

This year is the first time I've got one whole plot which is mainly peas and beans plus lettuce because I never used to grow many beans other than a few haricot, and that's followed by my alliums and other things. But every year I grow different things so some of the rotation gets stuffed up anyway.

I've never limed as I think my soil is neutral and everything seems to do fine whether they prefer more acid or more limey soil.

As for the leaving bean roots in the ground, it's never been really explained in anything I've ever read other than just saying they fix nitrogen in the soil by their nodules, which isn't very helpful really, as I didn't know whether this was purely living beans or decomposing beans or what.

[Christine]

The other thing about the nitrogen nodules is that they are depleted by the plant producing flowers and fruit - so they are really a short-term storage system. The only way to seriously boost nitrogen levels is to use legumes as a green manure and chop them into the ground before flowering.
MMM might feel this is a better use for those pea plants, anyway :-)

By the way, apparently adding nitrogenous feeds to legumes discourages them from production of the nodules and then they don't produce many flowers either.

[Odsox]

The other thing about the nitrogen nodules is that they are depleted by the plant producing flowers and fruit

This got me wondering (which is a dangerous thing )

According to New Mexico State University ....<<quote>> Almost all of the nitrogen fixed goes directly into the plant.
Little leaks into the soil for a neighboring nonlegume plant. However, nitrogen eventually returns to the soil for a neighboring plant when vegetation (roots, leaves, fruits) of the legume dies and decomposes.

Then I thought I would test it out.
I dug up a broad bean plant that had finished producing beans and carefully harvested the nodules. I then ground them up and soaked them in 5ml distilled water, left them for 10 minutes while I washed up the mortar and pestle before OH came home and found out what I was doing, and then tested the water for NH3/NH4.
The results were a huge 100 ppm, bearing in mind that artificially fertilised soil aims at about 20 ppm and if all the nodules in my bean row all broke down at the same time it would cause pollution, but of course they don't and anyway they spread into un-noduled (new word) soil nearby.

So I still think it's definitely worth taking advantage of a free resource.

[Millymollymandy]

Ummmmmmmm you just happen to have nitrogen testing gear (whatever that may be) handy then? I don't understand a word of that but never mind, bean and pea plants are happily decomposing in my compost bins so they'll go back into the soil some way or another.

[Christine]

I'm so impressed! Your results are convincing evidence that the nodules still have nitrogen post-production. No wonder we follow legumes with brassicas.

[oldfella]

This is amazing , all this post just because MMM hates peas, so I wonder what the results would be if I admit I sometime hate "GARDENING"

[Millymollymandy]

So do I....... or rather trying to always garden in tough conditions i.e. drought! Oh it would be so nice to live somewhere where it rained just the right amount.

[Odsox]

I have to say that you really should try different varieties of peas.
I have grown Onward and Early Onward for yonks and love the taste, but as I'm converting my growing over to polytunnels I find that everything grows so much bigger and taller that I'm trialling shorter varieties.
This year I'm trying Meteor and they are ready now and they taste horrible, all mealy with no hint of sweetness.
Last year I tried Fortune and I think they taste exactly like tinned peas.

Plus of course taste is subjective and quite probably differs with different soil types and climate.

So, like tomatoes, I will continue to search for a variety that suits me ... or I will admit defeat and prepare myself for growing six foot tall Onward, which is not really the problem I make it out to be.

[grahamhobbs]

Odsox, bit unfair to compare a spring sown one with an over wintering type. I grow Douce de Provence (also called Piccolo Provenzale), which I thought was the same as Meteor, over winter and I find it perfectly sweet. Perhaps in summer it becomes more starchy.

[Odsox]

Odsox, bit unfair to compare a spring sown one with an over wintering type.

Maybe, but then taste is a personal thing, plus I was taste testing the two varieties at the same time, minutes apart, and maybe eating any sort of fresh pea in April would taste wonderfully sweet.
Logic says that spring sown anything should be sweeter than over wintered as it has more sunlight to synthesise sugars.

As I have some Meteor seed left over, I will sow some this autumn together with Little Marvel and Douce Provence and do a taste test and a growth height test, and come to some definite decision ... or not.

Of course this is a very good example of why we grow our own veg, fine tuning exactly what we grow for our own personal tastes rather than being dictated to by commercial concerns, like Bird's Orifice.

[Millymollymandy]

I think I will change this to "Nope, I still hate courgettes!" as I'm overrun with them......