Albert Lea Seed House Spring 2018 Organic Newsletter | Page 6

P eas Q & A We’re fielding a lot of calls from organic farmers wanting information about growing yellow peas in areas of the Midwest not normally considered pea country. HOW FAR SOUTH CAN YOU PLANT PEAS SUCCESSFULLY? Although peas grown for protein are usually considered a cool-weather crop grown in northern climates, we’ve been pushing peas further south these past few years. We tried them in Nebraska about 10 years ago. It wasn’t 100% successful, because markets weren’t available and supplies couldn’t keep up. But five years ago we gave it another try with more success. Currently there are more than 50,000 acres of pulse crops in Nebraska, which is a huge increase compare to about 3,000 acres in 2013. Now we’re growing seed all across Nebraska. We’ve also been moving into Kansas – mostly in the northwestern part of the state – but this year we are expanding a little further south and east. Emily Paul Sales Director [email protected] 888-530-0734 “In addition to helping farmers select the right pea varieties, Pulse USA helps growers identify and connect with CAN YOU GROW PEAS SUCCESSFULLY IN IOWA? markets for their pea Yes, Iowa farms can grow field peas in both the semi-arid/low precipitation crops.” areas and in higher yielding environments. The first step is to select a variety that is adapted for a particular growing region. WHAT VARIETY SHOULD I PLANT? We’ve had success with DS-Admiral and Nette 2010 in Iowa. We have new varieties that were recently released, LG Amigo & LG Sunrise that may perform well there too. It will just take some on-farm trialling in order to determine if they will fit well. We also have some new organic field pea varieties that should do well in Iowa. In Nebraska, our varieties with shorter relative maturities are fitting very well in the dryer/hotter areas. DS-Admiral and SW Midas have moved all over the state of Nebraska. But we also have later ones that still have a place for some types of acres in Nebraska, just as we see here in North Dakota. Our later maturity varieties haven’t fit the best in really hot, dry areas, but they do well as we head east. HOW LATE CAN YOU PLANT PEAS ACROSS ZONES? Our growers in Nebraska are beginning to seed in mid-March on an average year. And that gets later as we head north. In North Dakota, for example, you’re looking at planting mid-April to beginning of May.