Sow super sweet peas now!
Beth Otway, one of our most passionate and knowledgeable sweet pea experts, explains why now can be a great time to sow them
Sweet peas are easily grown, hardy annuals that have delighted us for hundreds of years with their scented flowers from May, sometimes until October each year.
Sown in the autumn, they can produce superior, sturdier and stockier plants the next year than when sown in spring. Root systems are larger and plants are more vigorous, so you’ll have longer-blooming, better-quality plants.
To enjoy the longest sweet pea flowering period, sow seeds now, and make another sowing in springtime. Sweet peas sown now and later, and indeed in early spring, fare better when started in containers, while spring-sown seeds can go directly in the soil where they are to flower.
How to sow
Autumn-sown sweet peas should be sown in a top-quality compost, which contains sufficient slow-release nutrients to last the plants until they’re planted out in spring. Seeds can rot in compost that’s too wet, so ensure you have a free-draining mix by adding grit and sharp sand to your growing medium if necessary.
Sweet peas are deep-rooted plants. To grow good, strong, healthy plants, you must sow into deep containers that have sufficient depth to accommodate their ample roots. One trick is to sow your seeds in empty toilet rolls, but you can use any deep plastic pots, deep rootrainers (from Crocus, www.crocus.co.uk), or maxi rootrainers (from Haxnicks, www.haxnicks.co.uk).
It’s tempting to sow as many seeds as possible but don’t sow them too thickly, as your plants will just be too crowded. Sow one seed per empty toilet roll, one seed in each deep rootrainer or maxi-rootrainer cell, or sow a few seeds, spaced out, into a larger plastic container.
Keep outside
Sweet peas are hardy plants; they don’t need to be sown indoors, or inside a greenhouse. Place your containers in a sheltered spot, away from the worst of the winter wind and weather and leave them to grow and develop their roots over winter, ready to flower from the middle of May onwards next year.