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Sweet peas love an early start. Welcome
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to Gardening with Ben. Now is the time
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to be starting sweet peas off. Yes, the
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flowers what keep on giving all summer
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long. The more you cut them, the more
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they'll produce the flowers. If you
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leave the flowers on, they'll go to seed
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and they'll stop producing the flowers.
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So, sweet peas are great. They smell
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absolutely divine. in the last of few
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days in a vase and yeah you will have
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great amounts of flowers on them. So now
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is the time to be starting them. Now
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I've got a little secret how I start my
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sweet peas which do absolutely fantastic
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and they do great for germination. Some
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people struggle with germination of
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sweet peas. Now, my little secret to
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starting the sweet peas off and getting
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100% germination is I get a Tupperware
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box, put some kitchen roll in the
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bottom, and then I put the sweet peas on
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top, not in soil, just on top of the
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kitchen roll. Then I'll spray them with
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a sprayer, water sprayer, and moisten
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them up. And then I close the Tupperware
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lid. And that keeps them damp. It keeps
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them moist. They might go a little tiny
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bit moldy, but they will germinate. And
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I've had 100% germination most times
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when I've done it that way. And it
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starts them off a lot faster. They'll be
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germinating hopefully within a week. And
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then once they've germinated, you can
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get some tweezers, get your plant pots,
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and plant them out. And then at least
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you know which ones have germinated and
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which ones will start growing. Now,
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obviously once they start growing,
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you'll need to keep them somewhere
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warmish for the time being, but not
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somewhere that's got not enough light
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because they will go leggy and you don't
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want them to go legg as then they won't
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produce very good flowers on them. So,
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it's perfect for doing that way. That is
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a great way of germinating your sweet
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peas. Now, once they start growing, when
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they get to about 6 to 8 in, then you
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need to nip them off. The reason why we
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nip them off is because it helps them
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bush out. And the bushier that they will
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be, the more flowers that they will be
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on it. If you bush them out, the flowers
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might be a tiny bit smaller, but you'll
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get more flowers on them. If you leave
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them to grow without nipping them out,
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you might get bigger flowers on them.
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So, it's up to you at the end of the
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day. The choice is yours. But, like I
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said, the more you keep cutting the
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flowers, the more they'll keep
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producing. And sweet peas are absolutely
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gorgeous. They smell so nice and they're
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great to have in the house as a cut
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flower or to give a friend or family.
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And yeah, they will appreciate sweet
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peas. Now, there's many varieties out
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there. There's a perennial version as
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well which will grow back every single
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year. I've never tried the perennial
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version myself, but yeah, there's so
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many. And the best thing about sweet
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peas is that when it's coming to the end
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of summer, you can let a few go to seed
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and you can save the seeds for next year
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and it'll save you a lot of money cuz
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you don't get too many in a packet. So
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yeah, if you're wanting to save money,
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save the seed for the year after. So I
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hope you found that useful everybody.
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And as always, remember, keep smiling,
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keep shining, and keep gardening with
