Life Cycle of a Snap Pea?

[Setec Astronomy]

Hello everyone, I've been growing snap peas for several years now, and have had some problems along the way, but thanks to the helpful members of the forum this has been my best year ever! However, now my plants are dying from the bottom up as usual, I just got a lot more out of them than I have in the past (here is a thread I started a couple years ago about my "root rot": viewtopic.php?t=3082 )

I know another member at my approximate latitude recently said their peas were going to the compost bin (I think it was JRinPA), but my question is, is this the normal life of a snap pea plant? That when it's "done", it starts to brown from the bottom up, even if the top is still green, and in some cases still flowering? Do they just get to a certain height and that's it? Or am I still having some sort of root rot problem, it just took longer this year?

[bower]

I'm not sure if the life cycle here would be typical since we don't get peas until later in the year. But when my peas go down, it's usually as you describe. The plants turn brown from bottom to top.
I had some plants that turned brown entirely overnight after a hurricane. Speed browning. Others will make a green shoot out of the old stem and keep climbing until you tear them down.

[Seven Bends]

Mine do the same thing, brown and dry up from the bottom up and then sometimes detach themselves from the ground. In hot years it can happen pretty early and quickly. Thanks to mild temps this year, my harvest lasted longer than normal, but still only about three weeks. I pulled the plants this past week and have them piled up for the compost pile, whenever I can get to that job.

I spent a lot of time over the years reading up on pea diseases before eventually deciding the plants are just succumbing to heat. Apparently they're happiest between 55 and 65 degrees, do okay up to 75 degrees, but they suffer above that and kick the bucket for sure at 85 degrees, so a spring heat wave can zap them pretty early here in the mid-Atlantic. Apparently mulching them can help, or planting them where they get some afternoon shade. My strategy is just enjoy the 3-week harvest, then pull the plants and put in something else for summer and fall.

[bower]

This was a timely thread, since I'm just planting peas - really late I know, but it's been insanely cold here. Early plantings when it gets too cold, have not done well for us here. Now the temperature has rocketed up into the 70's and is even hitting 81 today, and I have a pile of sprouted peas that were supposed to go in this morning.
Really helpful, @Seven Bends to have the temperatures defined.
We're just not getting any of the moderate temperatures that peas like this year.
I wondered if I should stick them in a tray in the (cooler) basement and let em come up, plant em out when temperatures drop a bit. 40-70 F is considered ideal soil temperature for peas to germinate, so the next days ranging 70-73F wouldn't be too bad, but the forecasts aren't that accurate either and it's only a couple of degrees before you're over 75. Assuming soil temp is close to air.
This is probably our hottest day of the week, according to the forecast. Worst possible timing I guess.
I hate to take on extra work of planting them in a tray, and I'll have to wait I suppose until they sprout through the ground before I move the delicate things again. Couple of days. I have done that before (but not for heat) and it worked fine, it would just be more efficient to get em out there directly. Maybe I'll wait til this evening and see if it cools off a bit already.

[Seven Bends]

If you sowed them in trays in the basement, how long would you hold them inside? When does it start getting cooler in Newfoundland? I wish peas weren't so fussy; it's pretty much always too cold or too hot for them.

[Setec Astronomy]

Thank you both for your feedback, which I'll comment on and then move to the "indoor cultivation".

Thanks for the confirmation about "dying from the bottom up" being normal. The heat didn't seem to bother my peas, but the last couple of rainy weeks did. Also, before and after planting I had been using Tenet soil biofungal (I bought it a few years ago, I think it was mentioned here as being developed by the developer of Actinovate). I had intended to treat with Tenet about once a week, but as usual once things got going I got off track from my plans. I'm wondering if my success this year was due to a fairly dry/warm early part of the season and my treating with Tenet, while my recent die-off is from stopping the Tenet and it being wet. It may be that the dry/warm/Tenet held off the root rot for longer than usual (for me) allowing my bountiful harvest. I should note I grow these peas in containers.

Because of my prior pea germination problems, for the last few years I have been starting them indoors. I think the first time I used a seedling tray, but the last 2 or 3 years I've used Jiffy pellets. This year I sprouted the peas using the wet paper towel method, to maximize my Jiffy sprout count. I also didn't tear off the netting when I planted them out, which I also did for my tomato and pepper plants, after an experiment last year with some basil plants. Leaving the netting on (the thought being to prevent root damage) hasn't seemed to have been detrimental to any of the plants. That whole subject probably warrants a separate thread. Anyway, to Seven Bend's question, I usually grow the peas inside until they start falling over, which I guess is 4-6" tall. Some of that depends on my motivation level for planting them out.

[bower]

@Seven Bends if I actually plant them in a tray and wait for them to come up, at least 4 days maybe a week? before they have an easy to handle row of root and shoot.
If I plant them direct, I pretty well have to use row cover or the birds will have them dug up. So I suppose that'll be adding a few degrees as well. Only saving grace is that the water is icy cold. So giving the ground a good soak might actually take it down a few degrees, temporarily.
The two forecasters I use are both expecting temperatures to drop - one says two days away, the other says four days away. But the highs then will be running in the high sixties, maybe even dropping into the low sixties for a rainy week. So hard to tell, they aren't too accurate any more! It could be just fine for peas....
I read somewhere that 5 days of too hot weather can reduce pea yields by 25%. Although I really am more concerned about just getting them safely up, at this point. It is a bit too hot at the moment, 79F. I mean, it would be a shame to give them grief when I could just wait a day.
There are good sprouts on these, and I think I can keep them happy enough with a little rinsing or spritzing, to wait one day, probably not four though.

We have no "normal" anymore. It will probably be too hot at some point, who knows for how long? And probably cool too. Yoyo.

[Seven Bends]

Thanks for the confirmation about "dying from the bottom up" being normal. The heat didn't seem to bother my peas, but the last couple of rainy weeks did. Also, before and after planting I had been using Tenet soil biofungal (I bought it a few years ago, I think it was mentioned here as being developed by the developer of Actinovate). I had intended to treat with Tenet about once a week, but as usual once things got going I got off track from my plans. I'm wondering if my success this year was due to a fairly dry/warm early part of the season and my treating with Tenet, while my recent die-off is from stopping the Tenet and it being wet. It may be that the dry/warm/Tenet held off the root rot for longer than usual (for me) allowing my bountiful harvest. I should note I grow these peas in containers.

Well, I was saying that pea plants "dying from the bottom up" is normal from the heat, and also (though I didn't directly say this) just from old age/maturity. I wasn't saying it's normal for them to die from root rot (disease). Are you sure your peas weren't bothered by the heat? I checked weather for a couple of towns in 6b in NJ, and it looks like it hit 90 degrees a couple of days in April and got as high as 95-97 degrees on June 2, with 11-15 days above 80 degrees in June so far. That's awfully hot for peas.

When did you start harvesting, and when did the plants start browning significantly (not just a few plants, but a sizeable percentage)?

I think you're probably not going to get much more than 3-4 weeks of harvest from pea plants in this climate no matter what you do. Some years you're lucky to get one picking before the plants die.

[bower]

@Setec Astronomy in trialing quite a few pea varieties in recent years, I've noted that they all have a specific height that they get to, and a number of days from planting to maturity, not always exactly as advertised but pretty well consistent from year to year for the variety.
So I do think that peas (or the majority of peas) will reach a certain height and then it's over for the season.
Likewise they have a genetic code for how soon to flower and for how long. It's the kind of thing breeders select for.
So it isn't like indeterminate tomatoes, that will keep growing an infinite vine if the conditions are right.
There are a few varieties that I've seen, that will try to sprout again from the bottom, and do it all over again, except they don't really have a chance. They can make a few late peas that way, but never return to former glory.

[rossomendblot]

Our mangetout (snow peas) are finished already, from a February sowing. They can usually go a few weeks in to July but this spring and early summer has been very hot and dry. I like them finishing fairly early, one because I get sick of eating them, and two because it gives me a chance to get something else in the ground before it's too late. It's usually not worth growing peas past a certain point in the year here anyway because they are guaranteed to get powdery mildew and die.

[JRinPA]

It has been...8 years now for me for peas.

I do think it is the normal life cycle for these peas...they are pretty far from natural if you think about it. They were bred/selected to put out quite a bit of pods in a short time.
Unless damaged, they die from the bottom up. The roots start to brown and skinny up. Some years it is fast, some slower, depending on the weather "that week" when they start to go. One year it was dry when they started to brown, so I watered them, and they really died quick, then. But I watered the whole row so I can't say if they would have not died had I withheld the water.
I generally get one big pick where I take most of the fattest. Then I get a second smaller pick. By that time, the flowering has slowed dramatically. The internode length shortens and they basically stop growing in the heat.

I'd like to be wrong. I've never tried like triple phosphate or whatever to turbocharge them.

[Setec Astronomy]

Well, I was saying that pea plants "dying from the bottom up" is normal from the heat, and also (though I didn't directly say this) just from old age/maturity. I wasn't saying it's normal for them to die from root rot (disease). Are you sure your peas weren't bothered by the heat? I checked weather for a couple of towns in 6b in NJ, and it looks like it hit 90 degrees a couple of days in April and got as high as 95-97 degrees on June 2, with 11-15 days above 80 degrees in June so far. That's awfully hot for peas.

I'm pretty sure the heat didn't bother them, as you noted, a lot of hot weather here and my peas were doing great until a couple of weeks ago when I started this thread. Also, once I thinned out some of the dying vines a week or so ago, some of them are pretty strong (see below).

So I do think that peas (or the majority of peas) will reach a certain height and then it's over for the season.
Likewise they have a genetic code for how soon to flower and for how long. It's the kind of thing breeders select for.
So it isn't like indeterminate tomatoes, that will keep growing an infinite vine if the conditions are right.

I don't know, I have some that are still pretty strong and still flowering (see below).

It has been...8 years now for me for peas.

I do think it is the normal life cycle for these peas...Unless damaged, they die from the bottom up. The roots start to brown and skinny up.

Well, a week or so ago, I thinned out my peas, getting rid of the vines that were shot and leaving the ones that seemed to have some life/peas/flowers (this is a little complicated by the fact as I may have mentioned, I have 2 planters of peas, and each one is about half Sugar Snap, while the other half in one is Sugar Daddy, and the other is half Sugar Ann, and at this point I can't really tell which is which).

So I haven't been bothering to spray the peas the last couple of weeks because I figured they were on their way out, and today I noticed some speckling on the leaves, and I thought "uh-oh, spider mites" (my spider mite saga will be detailed in Sue_CT's thread in the near future), so I pulled a prime leaf (once I turned it over I could see the webbing) and got out my magnifier, and saw what looked like a lot of tiny water droplets...or spider mite eggs...and then I saw...a two-spotted spider mite!

So I'm not sure how much the spider mites have contributed to my pea problems, but after looking at the vines in this planter, I decided it was time to pull them all since it wasn't worth spraying. So the bottom line here is...many of them were "brown and skinny" at the bottom and pulled right out, while some of them still had green and strong stems (even if the leaves were significantly brown at the bottom) and were difficult to pull out. So I'm saying the time/heat/whatever isn't entirely conclusive and next year I'll keep iterating this a bit more and see how I do.

I'm not saying that they won't peter out, have reduced yield, etc., I'm just saying that whatever I did this year (unless it was just luck) got me WAY better results than previously, and I think maybe I can even do a little better in the future.

[JRinPA]

I took pics I was gonna post a few days back. I photographed the roots. I'll try to get them up soon.

We were talking about this at the comm garden. One lady put a second seeding of peas right next to or basically right over her first seeding. And she says they are still going strong, but both of her sowings were a lot later than mine. They maybe look green yet but they stopped flowering in the heat.

My last were snipped off a couple days back. They seemed plenty green yet but really not putting out many flowers in the heat, and made room for another sweet corn block. They really produced - I am talking snow peas, Oregon sugar pod II and not snap peas. I plant them the same way and harvest the same way, and my comments on this thread are blurred if that is an important distinction. I grow them the same way and think of them as the same thing, just that the snap peas get a thicker wall.

[bower]

My late late peas are just about 2-3 inches tall, and the birds have been picking them out to eat the pea! I thought it was the resident rabbit, and protected accordingly, but no. Chicken wire now in place til they get a bit taller.

[Labradors]

I went to the local nursery in June to buy some parsley after the rabbits ate mine. No parsley, but I came home with a dozen pea plants. I'd mentioned that I usually start my peas April 1st (if I'm going to grow them) and she retorted "These were grown April 1"....... When I planted them I figured she wasn't lying as they were extremely root-bound. Anyway, being a lazy gardener, I didn't remove the cilantro that was growing there, but planted around it. (I love cilantro). Now it's really tall, and the peas that I can see, look really good with peas on them! I was thinking that it was stupid to leave the cilantro, but it's shading them! With temps in the high 80's here recently, they need all the help they can get!

[Setec Astronomy]

I came home with a dozen pea plants

And here I thought I was the one that "invented" pea seedlings...nothing new under the sun, I guess, live and learn, etc.

[JRinPA]

Pea plants, yeah, I about wanted to slap a friend of mine that bought "bean plants" for a $1 each one year. Too much money there...I told him I'd gladly give him the same thing for free. No, its no big deal, only a buck each. Okay, I'll sell you the same for a dollar. No, that's okay, we like to shop different places...

I think that was the last year, I would drive down an hour each way with a bunch of plants I grew and give them to him for free. I guess it worked, I got them into gardening, but it just rankles.

So I took some pics of my peas before pulling the other day. But they are snow peas, not snap, Oregon Sugar Pod II, seeded about 3/21 or thereabouts. They sprouted pretty quickly and probably had agribon over them to keep the rabbits off while they were young. They had water early by buckets and then drip tape when needed starting in May. They leaned way west as they grew - NE is blocked in the early morning but they see overhead and west for the rest of the day. This row was picked once, then second pick was missed. There was some nice stuff on there that went to waste. But they started to rot from the root up this past week, just like always.

75.JPG

79.JPG

81.JPG

82.JPG

83.JPG

86.JPG

89.JPG

[bower]

Well @JRinPA you should have lots of seed there for next year.