“A scent that is swoonier than any other smell in the garden.”--Anna Pavord
In Judith Farr’s The Gardens of Emily Dickinson, Mabel Loomis Todd describes the poet’s generosity and enthusiasm: “in the dim and barely dawn of a fragrant summer morning…Emily caused a large cluster of Sweet-Peas to be gathered from her dewy, old-fashioned garden, that they might be put on the very first train to Springfield, taking the freshness of summer to her friends.” She enclosed a note with the blooms:
Dawn and dew my bearers be—
Ever,
Butterfly
Sweet peas, Lathyrus odoratus, native wild flowers of southern Italy and Sicily, were first cultivated by Francescus Cupani, a Franciscan monk who was the director of the botanic garden in Misilmeri, Sicily. In 1699, he sent seeds of the wild species to Dr. Robert Uvedale in Middlesex, England. The small purple flowers of this wild sweet pea are still grown under the name ‘Cupani.’ Many claim its scent is the richest of all sweet peas.
During the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, there were a few developments of new colors in sweet pea flowers. In 1870, Henry Eckford dedicated himself to improving the sweet pea. His breeding program in Shropshire, England, achieved greater flower size and an expanded color range. These sweet peas, known as the grandiflora, also retained the sweet scent of the wilding.
In 1901, a sport (a naturally occurring variation) occurred in three different locations: Eckford’s garden, the garden at Althorp House (the family of Princess Diana), and the fields of the seed company Unwin. These large, long-stemmed blooms had wide, frilled petals, but unfortunately lost most of their precious fragrance.
Henry Eckford sent seeds to botanists in the United States: James Breck in Boston, the Reverand W.T. Hutchins in Indian Orchard (near Springfield), and W. Atlee Burpee (former Pennsylvania chicken farmer), who had moved to California to make more money by growing and selling seeds. Sweet peas were one of the plants Burpee chose to develop, and in 1894, a dwarf variety named ‘Cupid’ was introduced. The climate of the central coastal valleys of California was ideal for their cultivation. By the late nineteenth century, trainloads of blooms were shipped from growers, and seed production thrived. Until the 1980’s, vast fields of sweet peas could be seen in the area around Lompoc, the sweet pea capital of California. Because of rising labor and land prices, most seed production has moved to Central and South America.
Here in New England, the season for growing sweet peas, lasts a couple of months, at best. Sweet peas need rich soil and ample sunlight, but they do not like hot temperatures, especially at night. England and Ireland have the perfect climates, where sweet peas can be started in late winter and bloom until the fall. For my garden, I sow seeds indoors by the spring equinox, soaking them overnight to soften the hard shell, which aids germination. Four or five seeds are planted in four-inch pots. After two sets of leaves are formed, pinching back encourages bushier growth and eventually more blooms. By the beginning of May, I plant them outside in manured ground. Eight-foot bamboo poles with string or netting are set up for the vines to climb.
My sweet peas begin to flower in late June. Mulching the ground by their feet helps to keep them cool. Manure tea is useful since sweet peas are greedy feeders and some gardeners believe that they don’t like chemical fertilizer. The only pests I’ve encountered are slugs, which on wet days are disgusting as they slime up the vines and devour the sweet flowers. Don’t follow their behavior. Though they smell delicious, sweet peas are toxic to humans. They must be picked if you want continued blooms because once the seeds are formed, flower production ceases. Even with conscientious picking, the heat of August in New England is too much for the sweet peas; flowering tapers off and the vines shrivel.
British gardener Anna Pavord wrote about her struggle after surgery when she could not abide using morphine. Instead she concentrated on the scent of sweet peas kept by her bed. “The sweet peas gave me two lifelines. First, they allowed me to lift my mind away from my body, its ludicrous state and its pain…and they gave me a most pressing reason to recover, so that once again, I could wander down the garden…to bury my face in their generous petals.”
“Oh, when the blossoms break…like heavenly winged angels, and their pure, cool perfume fills the air, what joy is mine!”--Celia Thaxter
February 2019
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