Let’s talk legumes, baby!

Well, maybe I got my wires crossed a bit there, but legumes are important in the garden, and I have a lot of them around, so I think they do deserve some attention.

Nothing to see here, because this is a freshly tilled patch where green peas were. I harvested about 2 kg of peas from 250 g of seed, which is not very impressive tbh. If I were growing peas to save money, it would not be very efficient. But I am mostly growing peas to improve the soil, which is why I immediately sowed this patch with peas again, this time with yellow peas. Those won’t be harvested at all; they will be tilled in green as a fertilizer sometime in August/September, after which this patch will be sown with durum wheat to test if I can grow it here.

Yellow peas started to swell up, so I do hope to get my own seed for the future to compensate for the very disappointing germination rate of bought seed. However, this probably won’t be impressive either, because many pods are attacked by pea weevil Bruchus pisorum. This pest is a problem in my garden, and there is not really a good solution.

Leftover green pea seeds from last year had a nearly 100% germination rate, and it looks like I might get a 1000% dividend. I am letting the whole patch fully ripen to get my own seeds. This variety grows extremely fast, so it is eminently suitable as a green fertilizer both in the spring before other crops, as well as in the fall after the main season. And the green peas are very tasty too. But the seeds are fairly expensive, thus the effort to grow my own.

White runner beans are starting to bloom. But surprisingly, some plants have red blossoms, so there was some cross-pollination with the red runner beans. Which is annoying; I wanted to get a pure white strain, and I am getting red blossoms from white beans. The hybrids will be perfectly edible, but…

Various bush beans are starting to look less pathetic, and first flower buds are showing up too. I do hope to get my own seeds for the next season; buying bean seeds over the last few years has been very frustrating and disappointing.

Alfalfa is now knee-high and flowering. I won’t mow it; I will let it grow until the end of August, then I will mow it and till it in. A lot of weeds sprouted in the alfalfa patch, whose seeds were suppressed in the lawn. That will be a bit of a problem the next year, when I want to grow spelt here.

And now let’s switch to native legumes that are important in my garden.

I did mention already that I wish to gather seeds of the bush vetch Vicia sepum to propagate it more around my garden for the future. But that is not the only native legume for which I have plans.

White clover Trifolium repens grows anywhere on the walk paths, and I intend to encourage it to do so by not mowing it too short. It is a pesky weed in a vegetable patch, but a valuable asset elsewhere due to its ability to resist being trodden on and to alleviate soil compaction.

Bird vetch Vicia cracca grows in the meadows outside my garden, and I found a plant in an area where it was not mown when making hay. I will harvest its seeds, and I hope to propagate it in my garden too. Fast-growing, local nitrogen fixer, excellent for composting. And when it sprouts as a weed in a vegetable patch, it does not compete much with anything and is easy to manage, remove, or simply leave to be.

Several patches of red clover Trifolium pratense appeared in my front yard. I have mown the lawn around them so the heads ripen. I want to harvest the seeds too. It is an excellent nitrogen fixer; in my area it grows better than alfalfa, and bumblebees love it.

And the last legume whose seeds I wish to propagate around my garden is bird’s foot trefoil, Lotus corniculatus. It is not as fast-growing and big as others, but it is pretty, pollinators of all kinds love it, and it is reasonably drought-resistant. Thus, another good local alternative to alfalfa.

The main downside to all these native plants is the same one that alfalfa has – the seeds are teeny tiny and fairly difficult to harvest. We shall see whether I succeed or not.

For many of these, to my surprise, it is also possible to buy seeds – they are sold by a shop selling beekeepers’ equipment and accessories. Although I would prefer to get seeds from local plants. These are uncultivated wildflowers, and thus they should be pretty genetically diverse across CZ, and indeed the whole of Europe. With seeds from local plants, I have a guarantee that they are genetically adapted to the local environment. Seeds from plants that were, most probably, grown in a warmer climate and better soil at lower elevations might not do as well here.

I am still really seriously considering buying a packet of seeds of each in the spring, mix them up, till the poorest soil in my garden (my front yard), and sow the mix there to see if something comes of it. The seeds are not that expensive, and it might be worth it even if they have a poor germination rate.