#Leggy sweet pea seedlings how to

If you are getting fed up with them on the windowsill, come April you can transfer them to a sheltered part of the garden where a frost won’t touch them. If you have a cold frame, you can put your plants in there from the end of March/beginning of April for a week or so until the risk of a hard frost has passed. Snipping the tops will make your plants lovely and bushy but it feels scary!ġ1. You can see where Ann has snipped the top out in the pic below

#Leggy sweet pea seedlings how to

So, here is how to snip and importantly where to snipĬount 2 sets of leaves up from the bottom and snip out the new sprout and leaves at the top Now is the time to snip the tops out – eeek!!! I know it seems scary to snip the tops off your babies but it will encourage more growth and prevent the seedlings becoming leggy resulting in a disappointing yield. After 3 or 4 weeks they will look like thisġ0. Place in the greenhouse or on a windowsill in your house, somewhere not to hot and not too cold and make sure they don’t dry out, equally do not over water.ĩ. Using a dibber (Ann used the other end of a Sharpie pen that was nearby) make 5 or 6 little holes in the compost about an inch or so deepĨ. While the seeds are in the water, fill some seedling pots with compost.Ĥ. Sweet pea seeds are really hard so Ann recommends soaking them in warm water for a few hours before planting to soften them & encourage them to germinate.Ģ. Of course there will be lots of ways to do your sweet peas, the head gardener in your family will have their own way, this is just how she does it and she is one of the most green fingered people I know. (As a rough time line, give or take – Early March if you have a green house, last couple of weeks of March if you are using your windowsill) I popped over to visit Ann in her greenhouse and took a few step by step photos of what we can do now in March. Here is a link to lots of choice over on Thompson & MorganĪnn uses her seeds year on year so any intel’ on the original type has been lost in the compost of time, so pick a couple of packets you like the look of and hope for the best! I like a mix of colour and a really strong fragrance. I am going to keep it really really simple and not link any special equipment that you don’t need, but make sure you buy the kind that grow tall -one year I accidentally bought trailing patio sweet pea plants – got over excited looking at the display outside Waitrose and didn’t read the label properly haha! Last year was a bumper year for Sweet Peas – Gav’s Mum gave me some seedlings from her 2019 sweet pea seeds and they were so good I promised I’d share her tips.