Austrian Field Peas in Zone 6

Fluffnpuff

Songster
8 Years
Nov 6, 2012
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Does anyone have experience growing austrian winter field peas in zone 6 and if so are they likely to survive planting in late Feb or early March?

After running out available garden space, I've cleared a section next to my house that hasn't been used as a garden in 20 years. I try to grow organic, but i've already used up all my composted chicken manure in my main plot so I'm planning on using the austrian field peas as green manure. I intend to use this section to plant flour corn.

Would planting the peas in early march give enough time for the legumes to add nitrogen before i plowed it up in early May?

The only cover crop i've used before is hairy vetch and this would be my first experience using austrian winter peas.
 
That would work, not sure about how much nitrogen fixing.
You may want to coat them with an inoculant first. Also sprouting them first could help.
I'm in zone 6 and use winter peas several times a year to plant in my rotating pastures along with several other things.
 
That would work, not sure about how much nitrogen fixing.
You may want to coat them with an inoculant first. Also sprouting them first could help.
I'm in zone 6 and use winter peas several times a year to plant in my rotating pastures along with several other things.

Thanks for the advice. I'll plant pole beans between the corn so hopefully the 2 legumes put together will add enough atmospheric nitrogen into the soil for a successful corn harvest. It'll be a good experiment regardless.
 
That would work, not sure about how much nitrogen fixing.
You may want to coat them with an inoculant first. Also sprouting them first could help.
I'm in zone 6 and use winter peas several times a year to plant in my rotating pastures along with several other things.

An update: Thanks again for the advice. I planted peas the first few days of march and now nearly all of them are up. I was worried the frequent frosts and rains of march would kill or rot them but they are growing well now.

I had intended to attempt to get a spring harvest of peas, then plant summer crops, then after the summer harvest plant peas again for a fall harvest. Several of the pea breeds i planted have a 60 day maturity date so I won't have time to plant a long season crop like heirloom corn so i'll have to plant something like summer squash, cucumbers, or radishes.
 

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