Do volunteer peas breed true?

[User Bp]

Snow peas are one of the few vegetables that do well in my garden, so well that I no longer have to buy seeds. They simply sprout on their own and are reasonably productive for a couple of months in the spring, apparently from pods overlooked or discarded.

Some of the pods are nearly stringless, others have pronounced strings even when the pods are quite small (~2" long). It's been suggested that they have "reverted" from a hybrid to a mongrel variety. I thought this impossible, as pea flowers are said to be perfect and self-pollinating. Is this correct?

Thanks for reading,

bob prohaska

[David E. Ross]

If they are hybrids, even the seeds from self-pollinating plants might produce plants that vary from their parents.

[songbird]

no bob, like you've found out, there are bugs which will pollinate beans and peas so they will cross breed.

it's fun to see what happens. :)

songbird

[bob prohaska]

Ok, so be it....

For the time being I'll just let them grow and pull out the strings. Otherwise the peas are quite good, with no mildew problems yet.

It does sound like I should expect the volunteers to slowly revert to a more wild state. At some point it'll be time to buy new seeds, but not yet.

Thanks to all for replying!

bob prohaska

[songbird]

i apply some selective pressure on the cross- breeds here. some traits i like to encourage such as having purple flowers or shelling easy is another (but not too easy -- shatter is a PITA for dry bean harvest if you don't get them early enough).

for pea pods i try to keep the blocks planted apart from each other, that helps, i'm not sure the peas are actually hybrids. i can usually pick the seeds from one or the other even if they get mixed together.

yes, for hybrids that's the kind of lock in to a seed company that i don't like. it also irks me about the GMO stuff too since i do like to grow edamame soy beans and the fields around us are planted with GMO soy every second or third year. every once in a while i should resource my edamame seeds.

y.w. :)

songbird