Planting Sugar Snap Peas

I'm so behind in my gardening this spring. I've been traveling a lot for work, so my gardening time has been limited. I am about a month late in getting my peas planted. I don't feel too bad, because a fellow Indianapolis gardener, Minji at thyme2gardennow, posted last week that her peas had just come up. 

I always plant my peas along my picket fence so that the fence can serve as a trellis. I usually just poke a hole in the soil with my finger, but the soil is a little too compacted this year. Instead, I used a 3/4" drill spade that I slipped into an interchangable screwdriver. Making the right sized holes with it was easy.

I popped two peas into each hole since my pea seeds are old. The seeds are three years old, but pea seeds   are viable for 3 years according to the Colorado State University Cooperative Extension. After placing the peas in the hole, I added a little shake of inoculant to the hole. The inoculant has bacteria that help the pea seedlings to fix nitrogen. Using inoculant is suppose to give you stronger, more productive pea plants. I planted yesterday so that I wouldn't have to water. It rained last night and is supposed to rain throughout the day today. I often try to plant when I know there will be rain. I want my seeds and plants to get a long, soft, deep soaking.