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what's wrong with my peas?
Sniffy Dog
Posts: 5
in Fruit & veg
Hi, I've encountered a problem with this years crop of (shelling) peas - it's not one I've come across before and I'm hoping that the more learned amongst you can shed some light on it for me.
To put it briefly, the stems of each vine are incredibly skinny and spindly from soil level up to the first real leaf cluster - around 20 - 25cm. After that, the stems are fat, firm and just as they should be.(see pic). Does anyone know what this is, what's caused it and will it be a problem?
sown in fibre pots indoors in Feb. Hardened under glass Mar/Apr and planted out under open top bell cloche late Apr until tall enough to reach netting.
thanks in advance
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Posts
Actually they look much healthier than mine - I have had one pod of perfect peas from each of my plants and now they seem to have just stopped growing completely. I think it may have been a result of the unusually mild weather followed by unusually wet and cold weather - not to mention the recent bouts of wind and hailstones?
Did you start them off a bit early and they became etiolated and drawn out due to warm temperatures and low light levels? It looks as if once they got planted out they grew away normally
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Thanks for the ideas - I've tried researching this a bit more, but it's hard to "google" when you don't know what you're "googling"!
I think what has happened is that the shoots bolted whilst under the bell cloches - I use large plastic vegetable oil bottles without the lids on. Once the cloches were off the shoots must have stopped "panicking" and proceeded to grow as normal....maybe??
This happened to my sunflowers last year, because I grew them inside in low light before popping them outside. They grew ok in the end, but I had to make sure they had lots of support the weight of the flower heads. I think your peas will be fine.
what did you start them off in? maybe the soil you put them was or is too rich hence the odd growth ,they need good soil but only need feeding when in flower.