6 SWEET PEAS 



so particular put the seeds six inches apart, and if you are rather 

 keen without being really enthusiastic, put them any distance from 

 six to twelve inches apart. I would name six inches as a minimum, 

 and in proportion as your enthusiasm is deep, I would advise you 

 to increase that distance to twelve inches apart. This is, I think, 

 quite far enough, when the blooms are wanted only for home and 

 garden. A plan that can be recommended is to sow the seeds 

 six inches apart; then as the plants progress and according 

 to your inclination, you may either thin out every other plant, 

 thus having them twelve inches apart finally, or leave them as 

 they are. Prepare the border in the autumn, as I have advised, 

 leaving the soil roughly dug throughout the winter, level it in time for 

 sowing on or about February 15th, and unless other details of 

 cultivation are grossly neglected I can assure you that the Sweet 

 Peas will blossom from early July until October. 



Protection from Birds. As soon as the seedlings begin to 

 peep through the soil, which they should do in about a month, there 

 is usually the question of protection from birds to be considered, 

 and, especially in the neighbourhood of towns, the ubiquitous sparrow 

 has to be reckoned with. This is an all-important matter. When 

 the plot devoted to Sweet Peas is comparatively small I know of 

 nothing that will keep these mischievous pests at bay more effectively 

 than strands of black cotton stretched zigzag fashion, so as to cover 

 the sown ground satisfactorily. I am afraid I can call the sparrow 

 (for he is the chief offender) nothing but a pest, for whatever excuse 

 may be made in his favour later on in the season (he has been 

 credited with searching for black fly) I am afraid there is no shadow of 

 doubt that it is the sprouting peas, and the peas only, that he 

 comes after in March. Sprinkling the little plants with soot is 

 supposed to be distasteful to him. But if all the methods which are 

 supposed to keep the sparrows away were really to do so how delighted 

 we should all be ! I am afraid that a great deal more soot falls on 

 the ground, than rests on the plants, and after a little rain even this 

 disappears. One cannot keep on dusting the little plants with 

 soot, otherwise it is probable that yellow leaves and sickly seedlings 

 would soon begin to tell a woeful tale, and the last state of the 

 Sweet Peas would be worse than the first. 



As I wrote in the Siveet Pea Annual, "it is no use attempting 

 to scare the birds away with flags of rag and ribbon, you must net 

 them out." This is a drastic measure to take, but I might add that 

 its recommendation had reference to Sweet Peas grown in suburban 



