"Sacha" wrote in message
...
On 2009-08-28 17:27:11 +0100, soup said:

We have a 'wall' of sweet pea plants that have had a GLORIOUS display of
coloured flowers, still displaying but a bit past their best. Have had a
lot of hover flies around them and there has been a lot of pollinating
going on. Now we are being presented by mange tout things but they are
'furry'. I take it these are the seed pods of the sweet peas should these
be taken of and dried or left in situ or ...? Any sweet peas we are
likely to plant next year will be grown from plugs/bought seeds so do we
actually want these pods for anything?

Unless they're species sweet peas (like Lathyrus matucana) they're
unlikely to come true from seed. You could keep a few ripe pods for fun
and interest but otherwise, there's no reason to do so. But if you want
to keep the flowers coming, cut off the seed pods straight away. We grow
Lathyrus matucana which I am particularly fond of, so I'm going to keep
some seed from those and see what happens.
--
Sacha
www.hillhousenursery.com
Shrubs & perennials. Tender & exotics.
South Devon

Hello Sacha, hope you are well. I always understood that sweet peas came
true from seed because of the way they were pollinated. Is that not correct
then?

Robert
www.rraa.moonfruit.com