We received this email from Rose Hogan of Galway:

Dear Seedsavers,

I attach some photos of the Irish green Pea crop in my polytunnel.

Sown in modules and transplanted into the newly erected polytunnel on a greenfield site, in the third week in January, this variety grew faster and taller than the Early Onward and the mange-touts sown nearby.

The Irish Green Pea also reached flowering and podding first.   The pods are smaller and the peas are to maturity faster than the early Onward variety.

The crop is heavy.

Peas in the polytunnel give an early green protein feast.  I provided no fertiliser, but did need to use slug pellets and pick out cutworms from the rough seedbed which contained skutch grass. The only drawback is that they take up space that one needs in May for transplanting plants which need more heat such as tomatoes,  sweetcorn,  melons etc.  Also it is a tall crop (touching the roof of the tunnel) and is shading plants to the north in my east west aligned tunnel.

The purple flowers in the photo are vetch from a Seed savers vetch/rye green manure mixture sown in November which hadn’t seemed to establish well, but which I couldn’t bear to dig in.

I also include a photo of Irish Green Pea planted alongside mange-touts outside.  The Irish Green Pea is taller than the mange-touts –  it has out grown the support sticks!

I planted six sets of each of three potato varieties, Homeguard, Land Leaguers and Catriona, in the tunnel and lifted all on June 4th, not because they were mature, none had flowered, but because I needed the space for transplanting courgettes.  Despite the short growing season which they were given,  all three yielded approximately 2 kgs of potatoes each.  However Catriona led in terms of size and cleanliness of tubers.  The Land Leagures were knobbled in shape and had a scabby appearance. The Homeguards scored the middle ground for size and clear skin.  All are delicious to eat.

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