Sugar snaps are easy to grow and even easier to eat. I cannot help it but I eat them while I am picking them. They are great in salads, soups and stir-fry. You can plant the seeds in the ground or start them inside in a pot. Either way, sugar snaps are easy to start, transplant and grow. The plants like cold weather but do well in heat too.
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| June 7, 2012 harvest |
Sugar snap are great climbers. This is why they are an excellent choice for vertical gardening. Sugar snaps can grow as high as 7 feet. My stalks are currently at 5 feet and still reaching for the sky.
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| sugar snaps are now above the netting |
Sugar snaps have curly tendrils that hold on to any form of netting. I use a nylon netting to hold up the sugar snap stalks. The tendrils hold onto the nylon and help keep the stalks from falling over. Sugar snap tendrils are very strong and skinny. As you can see in the picture below, one sugar snap was squeezed by a tendril. The strong gripping tendril left an indentation at the bottom of the pod.
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| sugar snap and tendrils |
I also recommend choosing a netting that has large holes. The netting I am using has four inch holds. This allows me to reach through one side and collect the pods in the middle of the plant. Lets look at the evolution of the sugar snap this season in the victory garden...
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| March 16, 2012 - sugar snap sprouts planted indoors |
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| April 12, 2012 - sugar snaps (right bed) transplanted |
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| April 27, 2012 - sugar snaps tendrils are attached and growing |
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| May 12, 2012 - sugar snaps going vertical |
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| May 21, 2012 - sugar snaps are climbing higher |
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| June 10, 2012 - sugar snaps are a foot above the netting |
Two weeks ago, I planted two more rows of sugar snaps in the main garden and a few seeds in Herb Row. In the main garden, I plant rows two to three inches away from the current row of plants. The new sprouts will still climb upward and will now use the first row stalks and the nylon netting as support.
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| May 21, 2012 - flower (left) and pod pushing out (right) |
I am using a triangular prism support for the sugar snaps in Herb Row. My mother made this support out of bamboo sticks, three metal gardening sticks and metal wire. She used it for many years to support her
bitter melon plants. I continued to use the support primarily for
bitter melon. I have maintained the prism over the years using additional bamboo sticks and green gardening tape. As you can see below, the bitter melon plants have taken up nicely in the garden bed and no longer need the prism support.
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| bitter melon have started to climb... go go go go go |
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