Gardening : Now’s Time to Plant Freesias and Sweet Peas

Two satisfying September activities are the planting of sweet peas and the equally fragrant freesias, which should go into the ground at about the same time children go back to school (unless, of course, you are on a year round schedule).

Both sweet peas and freesias are planted as much for fragrance as they are for flowers. If you think that sweet peas are not that fragrant--that they certainly can’t be compared to freesias--then you have not planted the right varieties. Though fragrance has been bred out of many strains, there are some very fragrant kinds available.

If you think you haven’t enough room, consider that sweet peas grow fabulously in a pot--just the thing to brighten a wintry patio--and that freesias can be tucked into any odd corner, but especially next to a path where their fragrance can be appreciated on daily strolls through the garden.

Being among the earliest things you can plant in the fall (our best planting season), they are also among the earliest to bloom. Both bloom in what most of the country calls winter, but what we call early spring--in January or February.

Neither require much water to become established, so you are not in danger of scuttling any attempts at water saving. Freesias can be watered just once and then winter’s rains, even a little winter rain, will take over and water for you. If it doesn’t rain, heaven help us, water them every other week.

In pots sweet peas need very little water because the amount can be precisely controlled. A 2-gallon watering can took care of the three pots seen in the photograph; they were watered about once a week with water from the bathtub.

Both plants also need support or room to sprawl so plan accordingly. Sweet peas need tall poles to climb. Eight feet is not too tall. Freesias refuse to stand upright and want to sprawl, another good reason to plant them near the edge of a path, so their flowers can rest on the clean pavement and not in the mud of winter.

The pots pictured, in my own garden, contain several of the Spencer strain sweet peas, including Shirley Temple (rose-pink), American Beauty (carmine-rose), Treasure Island (salmon-rose), and White Giant. All of these have rather large, fragrant flowers on stems long enough to cut.

And cut we did, every few days from January through April. The Spencer strains are excellent cut flowers, lasting a week in a vase. No other sweet peas have bloomed as much as these in my experience, or for as long. And, I am not alone in preferring the Spencers. They are, however, difficult to find but one source is The Country Garden, P.O. Box 3539, Oakland, Calif., 94609, (415) 658-8777. Their catalogue costs $2; Early Spencer seeds are $1.25 per packet and a mix is available.

Each pot also contained a treasure named Painted Lady, also from The Country Garden. It is said to be the oldest sweet pea variety in existence. It has smallish flowers that are two-toned, red above and white below. More interesting is the fragrance, which is strong enough to turn heads and quite different from the scent of other sweet peas. It smells less like perfume and more like candy.

Here are a few tips on growing sweet peas:

--Start plants only from seed, sown where they are to grow.

--Soak the seed in water for 24 hours, no more, no less, then plant immediately.

--Push them one inch deep into the soil or potting mix.

--Keep them watered and fertilize once a month.

--Cut off all spent flower stalks (though tedious, this really does keep them blooming much longer than they would if left alone).

I grow mine in Italian clay pots that are about a foot tall and 14 inches across. I stick three or four, eight-foot-tall, home-grown bamboo stakes in each pot and plant three seeds at the base of each, so each pot has about a dozen vines in it.

I can offer no tips on growing the incredibly fragrant freesias; they are simply too easy to grow. Plant the bulbs an inch or two deep and water infrequently. Flowers will last a month and can be kept tidy by pulling the spent blooms from the flowering stalk. If you want them to spread and multiply, try the pure white varieties.

Pasadena bulb expert George Scott told me this years ago and I have found that only the whites last and multiply from year to year. The new double-flowered strains also last a long time and all freesias will probably last several years, dying down for the summer and coming back the next winter, but the whites are the most sure fire.

There is no need to dig the bulbs up as is done back east. Just cut off the browning foliage in late spring and leave them be. They’ll be back next year.