Sweet Peas

"Everything"....ok, I'll keep my eyes peeled :D

 

You are learning, my child.:D:gnthb::rotfl:

 

Yes....my master (the evil emperor Dai Vadar ? :D)

 

No, the Dailai llama.:yho:

 

Good answer :D

 

Thank you. I am blushing here.:o:D

 

If you want larger blooms and longer stems, for the vase - rather than more, but smaller, blooms (for the Garden) - then take out the side shoots (ALL of them) and grow just a single stem up a cane or somesuch. So called "single cordon" system/

That's how I grow mine (which are grown specifically as cut flowers only)

 

My fathet used to grow miles of sweetpeas. He trained them as single cordons. He removed the growing tendrils to stop them distorting the stems. He ringed them up. I remember all this cos I got the job of handing him the rings. :ywn: Such patience. Oh but he had gorgeous sweetpeas and the house was always full of them

 

"He removed the growing tendrils to stop them distorting the stem"

Ah, yes you can do that - if a tendril curls round a flower it does tend to muck it up, but I find that happens rarely - the flowers grow outwards from the stem at enough angle to avoid the tendrils!, so I don't bother. But if I was growing for Show then I expect I'd need to do that.

I tie mine to the canes too (rather than relying on the tendrils to do the job). The moment a stem flops over (because it is untied) the growing flower stems them changes direction to face the light, and you wind up with curved flower stems that don't fit the vase AT ALL!!

"I remember all this cos I got the job of handing him the rings"

Thing of the past ... I use a Max Tapener gun, I can tie up a couple of hundred sweet peas with 10 minutes 2 or 3 times a week.

 

Hi Kristen,

Using the single cordon, do you then lay them flat? I think I have seen something about this somewhere but cant quite remember.

Steve...

 

Kirsten I would dearly love to see a picture of your sweet peas when they are in bloom.

 

As would I, I am more of a plonk 'em in and let them get on with it type with sweetpeas.


This will be my first year at growing cut flowers-and my first year at trying to arrange them.

 

The pictures aren't much to look at 'coz as soon as they bloom they are cut for indoors.

I've had a trawl of the pictures from last year and can only find one of a vase of sweet peas

"Using the single cordon, do you then lay them flat?"

Yup. When they reach the top of the cane I undo all the ties, lay them down, and then "up" a cane which is about the third one further along. Then they climb up again.

Bit of a pain AND all the stuff, now lying on the ground, still gets side shoots and they are much harder to pinch out.

Some details in My Blog (with some flowers on the plants too ... such as they were)

Taller canes this year for sure!

Picture of flowers from the garden (the sweet peas are on the right - THAT's YOUR LOT!) and three varieties that I bought plants for last year and which I rather liked (have grown from seed this year), plus a general "mood" shot of the Sweetpeas in the cut-flower area of my veg patch.

 

Now ... had you asked for photos of my Glads I would have posted these (second crop and last-of-the-season - WHY didn't I take any photos of the first flush? :( )

 

The worst of it is, I looked at the first pic and thought "they look remarkably like lilies" duh, then I panned right.


I have started off some glads for cutting this year-went for blacks/purples, whites and reds, you'll have to start a gladioli pics thread when they bloom this year Kristen.