I'm trying feltham first peas for the first time this winter - planted them in early oct and they've been healthy and have flowered. However, any little pods they try to make seem to be rotting off before they get bigger than a couple of centimetres. Does anyone have any advice?
They should not have flowered yet - I think you may have been caught out by our over long warm autumn. Once they flower they are tender and the frosts will have got them. At least i think I am right.
Rot has been a real problem round here this autumn. My chard and endives all look horrible. Even some kale looks a bit unhappy. It could be the contrast of mild spells to hard frost to mild spells etc.
many thanks - they're under cover but unheated so the frosts could well have had them. Are they likely to recover later do you think?
Quote from: bigpepperplant on December 13, 2005, 20:23:44
many thanks - they're under cover but unheated so the frosts could well have had them. Are they likely to recover later do you think?
Afraid it's very unlikely you will get a crop off them next year as they will be thinking their job is done. As already said, you have been caught out by the long autumn so I would start again in March to be sure. We are still being threatened with a very cold spell sometime this winter and the seeds will probably rot if sown now. Same variety will do if you still have some seed left over.
I think Your spot on Red clanger ,Plants are confused...
This autumn has caught loads of us out ..With overwintering stuff.
It is always a small gamble over wintering beans an peas etc but this year has been very bad ...I think Sep-Oct on packets should have read mid Nov ...
Same thing has happened to a row of broad beans I set in Oct..
Also had 2 rows of spring cabbage (spring hero ) heart up as little cabbages instead of going through winter and growing on..Ate a couple of them but others have had to be dug up now they have been frosted as we had christmas drumheads etc to go at .. Jim
Thanks for all that - nature is certainly a fickle thing. Is there any point putting some fleece over them in the hope that the new pods survive? They're in an unheated polytunnel.
Quote from: bigpepperplant on December 13, 2005, 19:33:55
However, any little pods they try to make seem to be rotting off before they get bigger than a couple of centimetres. Does anyone have any advice?
This sounds more like a pollination problem than a plant growth problem. I would imagine that there aren't too many pollinating insects around or that the pollen, if it is being transferred, is dying before fertilisation takes place, due to the cold. As long as the plants don't get too stressed, which will open them to opportunistic infections, and stay alive they will keep, or re-start, flowering and will eventually start setting when the weather warms up.
For those who keep track of these things, -18C outside as I type this. Our first really cold period this winter.
Crumbs, minus 18! hope you've got your woolly socks on John.
Today we have a sunny 9 degrees, and its time I got off the computer and started putting posts in on the allotment!
Quote from: jennym on December 14, 2005, 11:05:29
Crumbs, minus 18! hope you've got your woolly socks on John.
Today we have a sunny 9 degrees, and its time I got off the computer and started putting posts in on the allotment!
I occassionally include my weather extremes as, as Tim pointed out once, what I'm enduring now the U.K. will get in about a week, attenuated (for your sakes, I hope) by the Atlantic. Better get those posts in before the ground freezes Jenny!