Sugar Anns are in the House!
Posted by: TammyThe greenhouse that is! Nope, Sugar Anns aren’t the latest girl band. They are a dwarf variety of sugar snap peas and the latest addition to the greenhouse!
I normally grow the tall version of sugar snap peas. They can reach over six feet in height and love the cool spring temperatures. I often catch the boys eating them straight off the vine. There is absolutely no waste with sugar snap peas: the pods and peas inside are completely edible! That makes them easy for me, too. I can walk out fifteen minutes before dinner will be served, pick my supply, give the end a quick snip and pull the string off and then into a pan with a bit of butter! Oh my, my mouth is drooling at the thought! I cook them just enough to brighten the pods and warm them up. Just incredible!
My greenhouse wall height won’t allow me to grow my tall version of sugar snaps. Not to mention that the two long walls of my greenhouse are actually my vertical fences that usually support the regular sugar snaps. Cue in sugar anns! Sugar Ann peas are a dwarf variety that doesn’t grown much taller than two feet and requires little if any support. This is the perfect for my greenhouse. Even with the temps reaching 90 degrees. F. in the greenhouse, the ground is still frozen. I needed planters. I searched around my gardening supplies and found three window planters my mom had gotten for free from a neighbor that she gave me! PERFECT!
Window boxes now serve me inside the greenhouse as planters for the sugar ann peas. You can also see the jugs of water I’m using to capture the heat.
I’ve also been taking saved milk jugs filled with water into the greenhouse. The water heats up during the day and then releases the heat back into the space during the night. I imagine that the more things inside the greenhouse to hold the heat, the warmer it will stay each evening. I also had a crate of rocks we collected from various trips to the “diamond” mines in Herkimer, NY. I put those inside the greenhouse, too. Eventually, I’ll add those rocks to a wall and the sun will glint off the little double-terminated quartz crystals in the rocks. In the meantime, they’re heat catchers.
You can see my window planters with the peas and I moved my vertical pallet planter into the greenhouse. You can see the rocks and more water jugs.
The next addition? I would LOVE to be able to plant broccoli and cauliflower directly into the soil to the right side of the greenhouse but even today, the soil was so frozen. I might end up making another flat pallet planter if the seedlings reach a point of outgrowing the starter cups. Maybe spring will permanently arrive soon?
March 30th, 2015 at 8:35 am
I’m going to check out this type of peas! Sounds like a great addition to the garden. And your greenhouse looks great.
April 2nd, 2015 at 1:23 pm
I love sugar snap peas, Wendy! Dwarfs aren’t as productive as full-sized but the dwarf variety is such a great small space/small trellis option