Please help me grow peas, we all love them but i just cannot get them going. last year i started so many,but all being eaten by mice, birds and goodness knows what els. i cover them well and protect them like babies but alas :'(. Talking to the long standing old timers they say even the best cannot get a pea out of our ground. Please tell me this isn't so. the price of them :o. I'm on a hill and apparently if i was on the next group of lotties down i would be OK
ok a pea tip. Sow them in some old guttering then water them well before planting out. All you need to do is to make a small trench then slide them into that trench and water them in. Add something for them to grow up and you are away.
The_Snail
Hi I have just started my peas in loo rolls at home in the patio greenhouse!
I've got mice on the plot and they had half my broadies!! >:(
the peas have a long root system so they do not get disturbed when I plant loo roll and all ;D That way there will be no gaps ;)
Peas in newspaper pots here for a head start. They will be going under cloches hopefully tomorrow. The later in March/April I will sow a thick row of Alderman. Mine are always patchy thanks to every single critter in this part of Essex spreading the word that there are peas being sown. Some people soak them in, um, turps, or could it be parafin, to make they inedible for our furry friends, others sow them and put a thick layer of netting down to stop them. Some germinate them on damp kitchen roll then plant them, some soak the seeds like sweetpeas, and sow them then. The ground needs to be warm but damp, to cold and wet and the peas will rot in the ground, to hot and dry and they will just sit there doing nothing. Once germinated, plenty of support and then plenty of water as the pods are forming. Maybe it is pea variety that you should look at...something quick and easy maybe??
Thanks all many a good tip there, loo roll wow, something els to collect ::). Getting them started doesn't seem to problematic, its just keeping them alive, they get to about 6" tall and with all the protection in the world they've gone. I like the guttering idea will be giving that a go.
Hi karrot, can you describe what happens to your peas when they get to 6" tall, and what crop protection you've tried so far? ::)
Hi sprout, I start my peas at home in the greenhouse. They leave here looking healthy, i then plant them on the lottie, and they continue to grow quite healthily until they are about 6" tall. I've tried two different types of protection, first time i covered them with netting cloches. When i thought that they were big enough to cope with the ground critters i put in my canes and covered with fleece. A couple of days later, the fleece was destroyed and the big fat pidgeons had had the lot. The surviving peas also started to die.
I thought putting the canes in after, had killed the roots, so tried again, planting new peas beside the canes now in situ. I covered them again with the fleece and pegged it down best i could. Again the pidgeons had the lot.
i can grow them successfully in barrels in my garden, but i'd like to have them over the lottie. The pidgeons also sit on my wire cloches, squashing them with their weight so they can eat the seedlings. Do you think i'd be frowned on if i took my husband over to sort them out with his gun? ;D
oh poor karrot, you seem to have tried everything :-\ so it's PIGEONS. Squab pie, pigeon casserole, definitely - if they've been eating your peas they will taste delicious. Your pea rows might easily convert into patent Pigeon Traps, but guns are quicker ;D
Mesh alone seems to have discouraged the pigeons on my plot. I hope you get more peeps with ideas! Here are a few, forgive me if you've tried them already.
Provide food for the birds at a distance from young plants - put out bird food that the pigeons will enjoy so they're too full to go to the trouble of chewing through your crop defences. Goes against the grain I know but it might work. And water - if they're not thirsty, they might not want succulent sprouts.
Stretch lengths of black cotton (lots) over and at the sides of your peas between stakes. The birds can't see it and they don't like getting tangled in something they can't see. This is a really good one!
Find rigid row covers the pigeons can't squash. My mum had two galvanised covers, rectangular, about 2' x 5' and 8" high, like little short single beds in shape. These were made of very strong thick woven wire, I could sit on them when I was small without them bending, and they covered anything small including peas. Easier said than done, wish I could find them now.
Birds don't like alliums. If you have winter leeks, garlic or onions on the go and enough space between them to interplant pea rows, that might deter them. If not, cut up a few onions into halves or quarters and place them around the peas, and put cut up onion on top of your wire cloches.
You've probably tried all sorts of bird deterrents. One that's worked well for me when I had the problem on another plot was to fill plastic shopping bags with air and tie them to the top of stakes every 10 feet or so, so they bounce like pig's bladders on a stick in the Morris dance. It makes your plot look horrible, but worked better for me than all those CDs.
Well I hope one of these might work karrot, if not you have plan b!
;) Food for thought :) thanx S/Sprout 8)
Nice one Sprout ;D. This is only my second year so I'll not be defeated, i will have peas this year if it kills me ;). i think like you said something stronger, maybe a mini fruit cage type construction, with fine mesh, lots of black cotton, sainsbury's bags galore, barbed wire edging, and hubby living in the shed with gun. But never mind we are all enjoying it, children also.
the pigeons sit in the trees watching all the hard work going on, when your packing up your things they move down a branch, and there at your crop before you've reached your car ;D
and think of the look on the old fellas faces when you Have Your Peas ;D ;D ;D
Get the OH down there with his gun, and have the peas with pigeon pie.
Never? listen to `old timers`-well if they disagree with you anyway. can only suggest fleece,a gun,several cats some sort of scarer-but NOT black thread-it`s a killer,same as is wide mesh plastic.
Sorry to those who use it-we will have to agree to disagree :)
Ooer cleo, say more about thread - thought they just avoided it or snapped it if they bumped into it. Is it synthetic thread rather than black cotton that's the trouble? :-[
karrot, have you seen this thread? You are Not Alone!
http://www.allotments4all.co.uk/joomla/index.php?option=com_smf&Itemid=57&/topic,17047.msg179946/topicseen.html#new 8)
ha ha sprout glad I'm not the only one ;D
as much as they annoy me for destroying all my hard work i wouldn't want to conflict unnecessary suffering :-\. no black cotton then