The Blog Farm

Thursday, March 25, 2010

Peas out

I visited the coldframes yesterday to check the progress of the peas. As you can see in the picture, they are starting to take off now. This variety is the snap pea....I love these in salads and stir fry.

Peas have apparently been around for a long time....during archeaological digs they have been discovered in Egyptian tombs. No one knows for certain where the pea originated, but according to Chinese mythology, peas were discovered by emperor Shu Nung in 3000 BC. Shu Nung would scour the countryside in search of new plants in which to use for food or medicine. Shu Nung was considered the father of agriculture. Upon discovering a new plant, he would feed it to a dog first and then a servant. If they both lived then the emperor would eat it as well. (Sounds like russian roulette garden style.)

Did you know the garden pea has been used in genetic testing? I seem to remember studying about a certain fellow named Gregory Mendel in science class. Mendel is often referred to as the "Father of Genetics" for discovering the outcome of cross breeding different types of pea plants.


As for human genetics...you guessed it...the hippy chick photo is my darling granddaughter (Abby) She loves to peas out in the garden with her grandma :)


12 comments:

  1. I love to eat peas straight from the pod, I prefer that taste to when they're cooked. Also runner beans taste nice in the raw too when young and tender.

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  2. Jake: yep me too...straight from the garden is the very best!

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  3. Clever title...and very interesting! :)

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  4. Thanks and welcome to The Beer Garden NancyB!

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  5. I once grew scarlett runner beans when I had a huge garden over on the coast. My second story had a deck, which was about 14 or 15 feet above the ground. They grew all the way up and surrounded the railing as well. should one not eat them, they make a great flower display.

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  6. My peas are growing so slowly it's ridiculous. It's been at least a couple of weeks now and all I have are 1 inch spears from the ground. I can't wait until the weather warms up.

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  7. Hey Herb...I grew those the last two years and love the looks of them but my family was not fond of the taste...I'm with you though..they are really pretty.

    Thomas: mine got off to a slow start too...the temps were too cold to get the germination process going...I can't wait for constant temps in the 70s at least :)

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  8. I love the title! And your granddaughter is adorable;-)

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  9. Thanks Sunny for being there through all of this..you were a trooper....and it helped. it really did.

    i can't wait to share Teddy with you.

    sending love,
    kary

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  10. Hahaha, cute picture of Abby :)

    Btw, she was in the backyard "playing garden girl" yesterday. Hope we can see you guys sometime this week maybe!

    Love you,
    Britt

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  11. Britt: did she plant something? I believe that photo was taken by Daisy Girl aka Meghan your little sis...I forgot to give her credit oops...Abby is quite the doll! xxxxoooo

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