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Here you can see harvested pea shoots from “Sugar Daddy” snap peas.

Here you can see harvested pea shoots from “Sugar Daddy” snap peas.

If you’ve never grown peas before, you should! If you’ve ever eaten a pea fresh from the garden, I don’t need to convince you to grow peas. The sugar in peas begins turning into starch from the moment they are picked.

Growing your own means you get the sweetest peas with the best taste. With so many reasons to grow peas, Garden Gate has shared a few favorite reasons to grow peas in your garden.

First, you can plant peas earlier than most other seeds. Does anything signal the beginning of the growing season like garden-fresh peas? Peas are one of the first vegetables you can plant in the spring.

Plant peas once the soil temperature reaches 40 to 45 degrees F. Peas thrive in cool weather, and young plants will tolerate light frosts. Once germinated, peas adapt well to the cold, damp climate of early spring; they love it.

Peas are easy to grow; follow a few simple steps and you will be successful: Start by choosing a disease-resistant variety of seed to plant.

Next, be sure to water them and provide a trellis for them to grow up. Once your peas begin to produce, it’s important to harvest them often.

Almost every part of the pea plant is edible, Of course, we know the peas themselves are delicious, but in many varieties such as snow peas and sugar snap peas, the pods are also edible.

An often overlooked but delicious part of the pea plant is the pea shoot. The shoot is the tender tip of the vine which includes the leaves, stem, blossom and tendrils. They taste like peas, but with a flavor that is all their own.

When your peas are ripe, here is a harvesting tip: to harvest shoots, follow the end of the vine with your eye to where it joins the stem. Right where it joins you will see a little green nub.

Harvest the shoot right above it. That nub will turn into another shoot! Enjoy pea shoots fresh from the garden and in salads.

The more you harvest the peas and the shoots, the more they produce. What a win-win situation! Whether you are harvesting the shoots or the peas, harvesting often encourages the plant to produce more.

On the other hand, leaving peas on the pod too long signals to the plant to slow production as the plant thinks its job is complete because the produced seeds are still on the vine.

By harvesting often, you remove the seeds and that sends a signal to the plant to produce more. While you are growing peas, you can often harvest some peas every day.

Growing peas improves your soil; most plants need nitrogen to grow, but peas are nitrogen-fixing plants: They draw the nitrogen gas from the air and store it in their roots. When the plants are finished producing and you’re ready to remove pea plants from your garden, be sure not to pull the roots out.

Cut off the roots at ground level. As the roots decompose, the stored nitrogen is released into the soil, ready to be used by other plants.

So what varieties of peas should you plant? A good variety to try is Sugar Daddy. This variety has high yielding bush vines that load up early with double pods of plump, nutty-sweet peas at each plant node.

These are very hard to resist eating right on the spot, and they are resistant to pea leaf roll and powdery mildew.

If you want to grow peas in a container, try Little Crunch, a delicious new snap pea developed especially for growing in containers. These versatile and ornamental 24-30 inch vines grow quickly and reward you with lots of chubby, crunchy-sweet pods that make scrumptious, fresh-from-the-vine snacks and fast stirfries.

Train the little vines up short supports and they’re even easier to pick. These are great for growing with kids who love to eat them snapped fresh off the vine.

Desiree Dwarf Blauwschokkers is a variety that produces stunning violet-blue pods on lovely little bush plants that do not require staking. The delicious peas are perfect for soups and stews, or pick small and these can be used as a snow pea.

I hope I’ve convinced you to give peas a try in your garden. If I haven’t, find a local grower and eat some peas right out of the garden. That one taste will convince you.

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