Planting Southern Peas

July is hot.  The tomatoes are playing out and the green beans gave up the fight two weeks ago. There are, however, crops that can still be planted in July in south Louisiana.  Southern peas is one of them. They are also called cowpeas or field peas.Whatever you call them, they thrive in the heat and even on poor soils.

One of Benjamin's extra chores for the last week was weeding the row where the potatoes were planted.  I had decided that we would plant several types of peas on that row.  Benjamin got the job done and I quickly took the hoe to the row.  We had the potatoes mulched with hay during the growing season and it is amazing how easy it was to hoe up the loose, moist soil under the hay.

The first type of pea we will plant is Purple Hull Peas.  There's nothing real remarkable looking about this pea, but the purple hull pea is a great producer and they taste great.  I like eating peas over rice with a little bacon or tasso.  Add a few drops of tabasco sauce to the top and you have a filling meal.

Purple Hull Peas

On the same row, I put a stake in the ground as a marker to separate the varieties and I planted the second type of cow pea - Ozark Razorback Peas.  This is a pretty pea.  It is speckled red and white and is a good producer.  It was developed in Salem, Arkansas.

Ozark Razorback Peas

We added another stake to separate the varieties and began planting the next variety - Holstein Peas. Can you tell why they were named Holstein Peas?  They are black and white, just like the cow.

Holstein Peas

Finally the last variety on the long, 65 foot row -Black-eyed Peas.  Everyone knows what they look like, but I added a picture anyway.

Blackeyed Peas

All Southern Peas should be planted six inches apart, an inch deep.  Since my row is 24 inches wide, I planted two across.

An inch deep

Here is a photo of the row, looking from South to North.  If you look closely, you can see the stakes that separate the varieties from each other.  On the left is another row where the sweet corn grew.  At the very end of the row, you can see some Bloody Butcher corn that I'm drying on the stalk for seed as well as grinding for grits.

A row of southern peas

I was going to water them in today, but we got a 1/2 rain that was just perfect and will cause the peas to swell and germinate in short order.  In about 60 days we'll have a nice bunch of field peas to pick. Once shelled, they can be frozen, canned or dried.  I even read that you can roast the green peas like peanuts or scorch them and use as a coffee substitute.  I've never tried either of those things, but I may give it a try.