Snow Peas in the Spring Garden

I’m fairly certain that if you were to take a poll among people who generally like vegetables, asking “What’s your favorite veggie?”, almost no one would say, “snow peas”.  I’m not basing this on any kind of scientific study but simply on the response I get from customers when I mention them. People who buy Veggie Cages for the first time often ask, “What else can I grow on a Veggie Cage?”  Ooh, so glad you asked!  Presentation is everything, so I like to set them up for the big finish by starting my list with the more mundane veggies, the ones that you can get even in the most boring of grocery stores.  “Well,” I’ll start out, carefully modulating my voice so as not to tip them off to what’s coming, “you can grow cucumbers, beans, midget varieties of cantaloupe  lots of different kinds of climbing flowering vines” (some of which are edible, by the way)  “peas” (Getting closer…) “and my very favorite,” (Here it comes…wait for it…)  “snow peas!”

This is the point at which there is almost always the same bewildering lack of audible delight on the other end.  “Hello,” I want to say, “did you hear me?  I said snow peas!”

Hmmm…is it possible that some people aren’t completely sure what a snow pea is?  Or have they just never experienced the wonderment of biting into one – slightly undercooked or raw, with a little bit of resistance to the teeth, and that sweet, sweet flavor that’s so good you can just stand in your garden and eat them as you pick.  Whether you call them sugar snap peas or edible pod peas (which doesn’t sound nearly as exotic as “snow peas”), they are one of the easiest veggies to grow, with seemingly no attraction for garden pests and not prone to disease.

So for those of you who are open to the notion of falling head-over-heels with a vegetable that you may have never before considered your type, or for those of you who love them but have never tried growing your own, here’s a little pictorial for you on how to set up your garden for a rich man’s bounty of pricey sweet goodness (about $3.00/lb. at Walmart!) for a $.97 packet of seeds.  I give you:   How to Grow Snow Peas On a Veggie Cage.  Ta daaa!

After you’ve prepared your bed, you’ll want to install your Veggie Cage on whatever type of stake you want to use.   This is a chance to use those shorter stakes that have broken or were just short to begin with, because even the taller varieties of snow peas don’t get as tall or heavy as most tomato plants do.  But they should be at least, say, 4’ to 5’ tall.  Attach the clamp to the stake, push in the pointed end to keep it firmly anchored, and sow your seeds all around inside and even outside the bottom ring of the Veggie Cage.

And if you’re using a shorter stake for this, your Veggie Cage won’t extend to its full length, and you may then have 2 rings on the ground, rather than just the bottommost ring.  That won’t hurt a thing.  Now you’re ready to sow your peas.

Notice that I’ve sown the peas a little thickly.  That’s O.K., peas don’t mind being a little bit abundant; it allows them to use not only the Veggie Cage to climb but each other.  Sow your seeds all inside the bottom ring and outside as well,  keeping the seeds within an inch or 2 from the outer perimeter of the bottom ring, so that the emerging pea seedlings will be able to reach the Veggie Cage and grab on.

Notice in this photo the snow peas do not reach up the entire length of the Veggie Cages.  At this stage, the plants are not yet full grown and just starting to get the white flower buds that will eventually be lovely, hanging snow peas.  They may or may not ever reach the full height to which I’ve pulled up my Veggie Cages.  If they don’t, then I’ll know next year, if I grow the same variety, I can leave my Veggie Cages down a little lower.

So they’re off and climbing!  All that’s left for you to do at this point is to keep a little watch to be sure no stem gets left behind and doesn’t climb, then get ready with a nice bowl for picking.  You’re going to need one.

Tomorrow we’ll talk about the different types of garden stakes available.  Which one is best for you?

 FOLLOW US ON TWITTER TO WIN VEGGIE CAGES and TOMATO RINGS!

Our contest continues until the end of this week.  Know someone who likes to garden?  Follow us on Twitter @veggiecagellc, then re-Tweet our contest Tweet, and we’ll enter you into a drawing!

Grand Prize: 15 Veggie Cages and 30 Tomato Rings

Second Prize: 8 Veggie Cages and 15 Tomato Rings

The contest ends at midnight Friday, April 19th, so Tweet-Tweet-Tweet!

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Why We Garden

I have a memory that draws me back to our first year in this house and in this garden.  We put a fence around that garden with a gate, although not the beautiful soaring gate that’s there now.  On an April late morning, just sun-warmed enough to shed your jacket and hang it over a fence post, I went out to work the soil for the first time that season.  As I stepped through the gate and onto the gravel path, shutting the gate behind me, I felt the most delightful sensation of “Aaahhhh” slip over me.  Somehow, shutting that gate put me in an entirely different world.  This was a room, my room, and it felt like I was almost invisible to anyone outside of it.  As if my neighbors couldn’t see or hear me, so I could be free to talk out loud, bend in unflattering ways to turn the soil, or just stop and stare out into space, enjoying the smell of dirt.

That’s the way a garden should feel, whether it’s an old-fashioned farmhouse garden amid rolling green hills or a grouping of 5-gallon buckets of tomato plants, just yards from a beach.  Wherever you dig in your hands (gloved or not) and partner with earth and seedlings to produce a lush bounty, your garden is your garden.  And anyone who comes to it, who you’ve invited in to share the joys or scents or tastes of it, has been endowed with a bit of a sacred privilege   Because you’re invited them; they’re your guests.  They’re inside the gate.

Inside The Garden Gate is an invitation – an invitation for you to come on over, step onto the gravel path, and close the gate behind you.  This is one of my favorite places on earth, my garden room, and I’d love for you to join me.

Decisions, Decisions

Since this is our inaugural blog post, I thought it would be a good idea to answer some of our most frequently-asked questions, such as, “Which should I use, Veggie Cages or Tomato Rings?”  The answer is:  It depends on what you’re growing.  In general, the Veggie Cage is best when you need to support a plant that wants to climb and uses tendrils to do so.

Peas, beans, snow peas (my favorite!) and cucumbers are exactly the types of plant that take readily to a Veggie Cage.  Not that you can’t use a Veggie Cage for tomatoes.  Before the introduction of the Tomato Rings, those of us who worked the Veggie Cage test garden were ecstatic with using the new Veggie Cage for our tomato plants.  In fact, they were originally designed for tomato plants.  I still like them for those “tomatoes on steroids” varieties, like Brandywine.

But if you’re going to use the Veggie Cage for tomatoes, you have to follow the instructions, which aren’t at all difficult but oh-so-important.  Tomato plants will often try to head out one of the rings of the Veggie Cage.  It’s quite easy to just nudge that runaway branch back into the appropriate ring.  But if you don’t, then when the branch develops big, fat tomatoes, all of that fruit puts its entire weight on one ring and distorts it.  The Veggie Cage is designed to hold the weight evenly from the inside out.

The Tomato Ring is really just as simple as its name implies.  In my opinion, it’s what I would use for tomatoes, about 3 per plant.  And I would definitely recommend them for peppers.  You can use one per pepper plant, and if you’re short on space, you can use one 3-ft. piece of stake with two back-to-back Tomato Rings, 1 pepper in each ring.  The only pepper I’ve ever grown that used more than one Tomato Ring was last year’s tobasco peppers.  They towered over our little sweet banana pepper plants.  But generally one will do it.  For eggplant, you’ll use 1, maybe 2 for each plant.

Enter to win Veggie Cages and Tomato Rings in our Blog Launch Giveaway!

To celebrate the launching of Inside The Garden Gate, we’re giving away Veggie Cages and Tomato Rings!

Here’s how the contest works:   Follow us on Twitter @veggiecagellc, then reTweet our contest tweet, and you will be entered to win!

Grand Prize: 15 Veggie Cages and 30 Tomato Rings

Second Prize: 8 Veggie Cages and 15 Tomato Rings.

You will be entered each time you reTweet.  The contest ends at midnight Friday, April 19th, so follow us and Tweet-Tweet-Tweet!

Our next blog:  OOOOH, SNOW PEAS!