Plant Database / Vegetables / Sugar Snap Pea
Vegetables

Sugar Snap Pea

Pisum sativum
Fabaceae (Legume)

Sweet, crunchy, edible-pod peas for the cool seasons. Trellis the climbing types and pick often.

EdibleCool-seasonBeginner-friendlyFixes nitrogen
Sugar Snap Pea (Pisum sativum) illustration — Texas Roots plant database, by Jordan Polasek
Sun
Full sun
Water
Even
Soil
Average
pH
6.0-7.5
Hardiness
Cool-season annual
Height
2-6 ft
Spacing
2-3 in
Days to harvest
60-70

What it is

Sugar Snap Pea (Pisum sativum) is in the Fabaceae (Legume) family. Sweet, crunchy, edible-pod peas for the cool seasons. Trellis the climbing types and pick often.

How to grow it

It wants full sun, water it even, and give it average soil. Target a soil pH around 6.0-7.5. Space plants about 2-3 in apart. Expect roughly 60-70. Cool-season annual.

How it's used

Sugar Snap Pea is used: raw, stir-fry, steamed.

🔎 How to identify it

  • Tendrils, paired leaflets
  • White flowers
  • Plump edible pods

Edibility

PartsWhole pods
UsesRaw, stir-fry, steamed
CautionBolts and toughens in heat.
The grow guide

How to grow & propagate sugar snap pea

Everything I've worked out about starting this one, keeping it alive through a Texas year, and turning one plant into many — free.

How to propagate sugar snap pea

Legumes resent transplanting — that taproot wants to go straight down — so sow them right where they'll grow once the soil has warmed. Soak hard-coated seed overnight to speed germination. As a bonus, this whole family pulls nitrogen out of the air and banks it in the soil, so wherever you grow them you're feeding next season's crop.

Growing sugar snap pea in Texas

Give it full sun and average soil. Match the spot to the plant and most of the battle is already won.

This is a cool-season crop. On the Texas Gulf Coast that means your real windows are fall and late winter, not summer — sow as the heat breaks in September–October and again in late winter, and you'll harvest through our mild winters while the rest of the country is frozen out.

Keep moisture even, especially while it's young — deep, less-frequent soaks build better roots than a daily sprinkle.

Harvesting

Figure on roughly 60-70 before you're harvesting. Harvest at peak and keep harvesting — most vegetables produce harder the more you pick, and one left to over-mature tells the plant its job is done. The part you're after: whole pods.

Making more for free

Every seed we sell is open-pollinated, which means you can save your own from the best plants and it'll grow true next year. Let a few of your strongest plants finish and go to seed, dry it fully, and store it cool and dark. That's the whole point of heirlooms — buy once, grow forever.

🌤 Before you plant: check the live 7-day garden weather to time it right for frost and heat.

Part of the free Texas Roots plant database, compiled by Jordan Polasek from his greenhouse in El Campo, Texas. Free to read and share. If it helped, the best thanks is to grow something.