Growing peanuts

By shauna dobbie

Did you know? Peanuts are legumes, not nuts!

Have you ever thought of growing peanuts? It’s not crazy if you live in Southern Ontario, where days are hot and the summer extends long enough. Nova Scotia is another spot where peanut growing has been successful. It’s more of a chore if you live on the West Coast, where the growing season is long but the daytime temperatures are more temperate. On the prairies, the shorter growing season is sure to be a challenge. Let’s look at how you can try to overcome your environmental challenges and grow some peanuts at home.

How peanuts work

First off, peanuts aren’t nuts. They’re legumes.

Peanuts aren’t like any other plant you’ve likely grown in that they are geocarpic. This means that they flower above ground but produce their seeds underground.

The plant produces bright yellow flowers that look like other legume flowers of beans or peas. Once that flower is pollinated—and it pollinates itself, not requiring wind or insects—a structure at the base of the flower grows longer, down toward the soil. This structure, called a peg, contains the pollinated ovary at the tip, which develops the peanut pod underground. That’s right: a peanut pod is like a bean pod except that it grows underground.

This process is called geocarpy. A few plants reproduce like this, but the peanut is the best known.

Peanuts originated in South America, probably in Argentina and Bolivia. When Linnaeus, the great namer of plants considered them, he gave them the Latin name Arachis hypogaea. The specific epithet hypogaea translates as “below the earth”, owing to peanuts developing their seeds in the ground. The genus name, which sounds like something to do with spiders (arachnids) is, in fact, the name of a plant called chickling vetch.

Heat

Peanuts require at least 95 days to reach maturity and most varieties require 120 or more. There are more than 95 frost-free days across the southern prairies, where most places enjoy a growing season from just before June through at least the beginning of September. But peanuts need 3,000 corn heat units (CHU) to mature. If they get less heat, they won’t mature to their full potential. You will get a reduced harvest.

What is CHU? It’s a complex number based on maximum and minimum temperatures that accumulates from April 1 to October 31. A minimum of 3,000 CHU is reached in a few places in Canada, in

Some average corn heat units for a handful of cities across Canada. The information was taken from an organization called Farm West. Their data is not very complete east of Ontario.

British Columbia

Victoria 3229 Vancouver 3336 Kelowna 3564 Kamloops 3568 Prince George 2110

Alberta

Edmonton 2640 Red Deer 2316 Calgary 2569 Lethbridge 2681 Medicine Hat 3046

Saskatchewan

Prince Albert 1627 Saskatoon 2678 Moose Jaw 2798 Regina 2750 Estevan 2721

Manitoba

The Pas 2550 Dauphin 2750* Brandon 2686 Winnipeg 3386 Morden 3170

Ontario

Sudbury 2914 Windsor 4170 London 3703 Toronto 4082 Kingston 3493 Ottawa 3466

Quebec

Quebec City 2919

New Brunswick

Moncton 2978 Saint John 2598

Nova Scotia

Halifax 3084 Kentville 3184

Prince Edward Island

Charlottetown 2939 Summerside 3006

Newfoundland

St. John’s 2093

All numbers taken from farmwest. com/climate/calculators/corn-heat-units except: Dauphin, estimated from https:// www.gov.mb.ca/agriculture/weather/ pubs/total-acc-chu.pdf

Arachis hypogaea. Southern Ontario. I’ll give you the equation, but if you aren’t into math and statistics, don’t worry: [1.8(daily minimum temperature in Celsius – 4.4) + 3.3 (daily maximum temperature in Celsius – 10) – 0.084 (daily maximum temperature in Celsius – 10)2]/2 = CHU

Growing peanuts

If your area has the right (or almost the right) amount of heat, or if you want to give it a try regardless, here’s what you need to do.

Peanuts like sandy soil that is loose, so the pegs can get through the surface. Anything that tends to crust over won’t do because you shouldn’t hoe around peanuts. They also need as much sun as you can give them.

You can start peanuts before the last frost indoors. It’s best to buy seeds because most in-shell peanuts marketed for food have been roasted or blanched. You can buy a strain developed for northern gardens from Annapolis Seeds in Nova Scotia. The owner has been growing peanuts since 2009, starting with saving seed from the most productive plants and planting them. He calls the resulting strain ‘Annapolis Select’. He started the process with Valencia seeds from OSC in Ontario.

You plant the seed without the shell, but you leave the red, papery skin on. Space them about 4 to 6 inches apart if you’re direct sowing, a couple of weeks after the last frost, and thin them to 10 inches apart once the second set of leaves comes out. If you’re starting the seeds inside, give Scan me

Growing peanuts in Nova Scotia

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7u9_ mHLgqOQandfeature=emb_logo

them plenty of room to grow because they grow fast and don’t like to be rootbound. If you plan to keep them in pots, remember that they need a good 6 inches of soil around the plant for pegging.

They don’t need nitrogen because they fix nitrogen in the soil (as legumes), but they appreciate calcium, particularly when they’re pegging. You can get organic gypsum to apply when your peanuts bloom, around mid summer, to assist with calcium.

Wait until the leaves have yellowed from a light frost in the fall then dig up your peanuts. If fall comes early in your part of the country, cover the plants with a frost cover to keep them in the ground as long as possible.

Dig up the entire plant with a garden fork. Give them a shake to get excess soil off then tie them in bunches (a few plants per bunch) and hang them in a very dry place to cure for two or three weeks. Make sure wildlife can’t get to them wherever they are curing.

After two or three weeks, remove the peanuts from the plants and

ick Culbert. Photo by d

Peanut flower. Developing pods of peanuts.

put them on trays, one layer deep, indoors. Again, you want a dry spot. They can get moldy even if they seem dry so make sure they have plenty of air around them.

After another four to six weeks, they should be ready. You can now roast them, either in or out of the shells.

You can eat them before they’ve cured as well. Boil them in salt water like edamame.

Expanding the season

What to do in a cooler area or shorter season • Preheat the soil with plastic; remove the plastic sheeting when the plant flowers • Use row covers at night • Start peanuts indoors • Grow them in a large container that you can move inside and outside in spring and fall. r Scan me

Pegging peanuts

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvxWO-WsM_Q

Honey roasted peanuts

Ingredients:

2 tablespoons butter 1/3 cup honey 1 teaspoon salt 3 cups raw, shelled peanuts, skins on or off ¼ cup sugar

Optional: 1 teaspoon vanilla extract and ½ teaspoon cinnamon

Or ¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit.

Prepare a baking sheet with aluminum foil and non-stick spray.

Mix the butter, honey, salt and any seasonings you are using in a microwavable bowl.

Microwave for about 30 seconds, until the butter is melted. Stir to mix well.

Stir in the peanuts, then dump the mixture on the baking sheet. The peanuts should be evenly spaced and a single layer deep.

Bake for 20 minutes. Keep an eye on them and stir periodically to bake them evenly.

Remove from the oven and let them cool for about two minutes.

Sprinkle with sugar and toss them.

You can eat them warm or let them cool first.