Sweet Peas 



The harvesting in England is done by hand 

 picking. The pods begin to get ripe by the end 

 of July and they require to be gathered once or 

 twice a week according to the weather conditions 

 which prevail. In some seasons this work may 

 go on until the end of September, but such pro- 

 longed seasons are not liked as they mean the 

 process of ripening is slow and unsatisfactory. 



In England where the crops are grown on stakes, 

 the process of rogueing is easily done and growers 

 have no excuse for not purifying their stocks, if 

 they possess the knowledge and skill necessary 

 to do the work. People who do not possess 

 such, should certainly not call themselves experts. 

 A great work has been done in the way of renewing 

 stocks in recent years. Varieties are raised by 

 cross-fertilization, identical with the older named 

 varieties, and many of the stocks on the market 

 now are not the original ones, but new re-created 

 ones. 



The care of stock seed is an expression which 

 may not convey much to the ordinary reader, 

 but it is the crux of all successful seed growing, 

 whether it be Sweet Peas or anything else. Just 

 as the rearer of pedigree cattle looks ever and 

 always to the parents of his stock, so does the 

 raiser of good strains of seeds. In two generations 



72 



