Give peas a chance...

This is the third year now that I've been growing peas. I've gone for the Kelvedon Wonder variety, which are short plants that are pretty easy to grow in tubs in the garden.

My current pea plants

I've not been growing on any kind of scale, so I couldn't expect to make a decent bowl of pea soup even if I had a high yield! Year one results were pretty good - I had eight plants and got a couple of handfuls. They taste amazing straight from the pod - in fact, if you get there while they are young the pods taste great too...

Year two, my yield was pathetic - from six plants I got less than a handful. Branching out I'd taken to growing pea shoots for adding to salads - easy to grow and they bring a subtle pea flavour to the mix.

It's probably down to overwatering, but I also have had trouble with the plants turning brown at the bottom, looking like they are dying from the base up... perhaps some of you more experienced grow-your-own bloggers will know why that is...?

Year three, and I've only got two plants on the go at the moment, but look at the beauties (pictured above)! Not a more satisfying sight than the sun shining through the pods revealing the developing peas.

I was amazed though when I went over to my mini-greenhouse yesterday. I had a number of seedlings in there which I've pretty much let run to seed, due to a lack of time to care for them.

Amongst the wilting dwarf beans and flowering radishes, were some of the most sorry looking pea plants I have ever seen...

...but lo and behold! Pods! Couldn't believe that the plants had managed to grow any, given I hadn't watered them for a couple of months. You can see the plants to the left... bereft of care and attention...

I popped the pods and turned out the best peas I've produced thus far...! I confess to devouring them shortly after the photo was taken.

It makes me wonder why I bothered with all the fancy cane work, training them tenderly up supports, and finding the best spot for them in the garden... looks as though the most productive method is hard labour!

Still, I'm waiting on my couple of tenderly cared-for plants to produce, and hopefully enough of a yield to compliment a meal for two.