Drying peas for seeds for next year? help

[Gazinga]

do i have to let the peas dry on the vine or can i pick them and set them to dry in order to produce seed-able peas for next years planting?

 

[digitS']

Hmmmm.

Are your vines turning yellow and dying? I wait until that point to collect seed.

I've had trouble with weevils before. With your seed in clear plastic or glass, you can watch for bugs and holes in the seed. A friend says to put the seed in the freezer at that point. I've done that and still had live weevils when I've brought the seed back out after a day or 2.



Snow peas have less of a problem . . . for me, anyway.

Steve

 

[Gazinga]

thx digits, my vines are starting to yellow and die back, yes. There are a few totaly dryed up peas on the vine and the rest look like tehy are starting to dry, so i should be fine to pick and dry them now, right? Is there any negative effects to me drying them totaly and them freezing them for a long time before storing them?

 

[Gazinga]

anyone?

 

[headred]

I pick mine and let them dry. I keep them in a sealed jar so don't know much about freezing them.

 

[patandchickens]

I would let them dry til rattley on the vine - I don't know for sure at exactly what earlier point you can take 'em. Once the vines are basically dying back and the peas are 'mostly' ready, you can pull the vines and hang 'em in a garage or something like that, if you think you'll get fewer weevils that way.

Killing stored-product pests in the freezer takes a week or two, not just a day or two. Seriously. I have no reason to believe that 3 wks in the deep freeze will damage the viability of pea seeds but I have never actually tried it myself; you might do a trial batch (just put a handful of seeds in the freezer and keep another handful out, then after 3 wks see if the freezer batch germinates as well as the stayed-out batch, using damp paper towels in a ziploc baggie) if you want to be careful.

Good luck, have fun,

Pat

 

[DrakeMaiden]

You can harvest before they completely dry down . . . here is a good blogpost about it. Basically they say that once the pod starts to look like it is no longer receiving moisture or nourishment from the plant, you can bring it indoors to dry.