Homemade Pea Sheller

Having grown up on a farm, I can appreciate the labour-saving advantage machines provide for larger-than-backyard scale agricultural work. As a child I was fascinated by the various machines littering our farm in all their mechanical complexity and glory (and sometimes lack of).

Gradually with age I have come to avoid mechanical complexity as much as possible (for various reasons, esp. $$$) and enjoy the simple but effective, quiet, non-motorized hand-held tools of the backyard garden. But I must admit my aunt's homemade pea sheller seems like a great idea for both rural and urban agriculture. Shelling peas from a large garden can become tedious!

Step 1: Load peas into inner threshing cylinder.

Step 2: Set wire-mesh door in place onto the cylinder. The wire-mesh holds the pods while the peas fall through.

Step 3: Close outer screened hatch and slide pea collection tray below the wire-mesh cylinder. The outer screen keeps the peas from flying all over the place.

Step 4: Turn crank (various methods, see below).

The pulleys on the right side spin the inner paddles inside the threshing cylinder at a speed faster than the hand crank. The pulleys on the left turn the outer paddles & wire mesh cylinder at a slower speed than the hand crank. This causes the pea pods to get a real paddling, gradually split open and separates the peas from the pods. The peas fall through the wire-mesh onto the collection tray below while the pods remain inside the wire-mesh cylinder.

The pea sheller was built using plans from Saskatchewan Agriculture's website.

I'm thinking this could be a great project for a community garden. This is one option of many for such a device, but seems to be effective.

For those overwhelmed by the thought of turning a crank for a lengthy time, they can always try my aunt's method of attaching an electric drill to the crankshaft. Even my uncle was convinced after first scoffing at this method. My aunt left to pick some more peas leaving my uncle to operate the crank. When she returned, she found him using the drill!

July Rains = Harvest Gains

July has brought much needed rain, resulting in swiss chard, spinach, rhubarb, oregano, lovage and kale harvest nearly faster than we can keep up! Most is eaten fresh and maybe 30% frozen for use in winter. Bolted spinach harvest has involved chopping entire plants and stripping leaves, leaving most in garden to go to seed.

Most plants in photos are likely obvious, except maybe the Chervil at the bottom center of the above photo. Chervil is a yummy herb with liquorish-like flavouring. Note Lovage behind Brussels Sprouts at nearly 6 feet high (even after I chopped some down)!

The Blue Curled Kale, transplanted outside May 5, was ready to start harvesting the first week of July (left of Brussels Sprouts in above photo). The Dwarf Green Curled Kale (center of above photo) planted directly outdoors from seed (Apr. 11) is not ready yet for harvest, maybe by the end of the month.

The feathery looking plants in above photo is Dill, planted directly outdoors May 28. The large leafy looking thing at center right in above photo is a volunteer poppy from the neighbours yard, left to grow.

Should have allowed more spacing for the Bubbles Brussels Sprouts! The sprouts are just starting to form along the stems and branches. This is fascinating for us since we have never grown these before.

Potatoes (between strawberries and tomatoes above), planted June 21, came up July 8! These potatoes were thought to be a one-of-a-kind breed (by myself) since they were re-planted at the grandparents farm for nearly a half century. However, I have been corrected and need a crash course on potato breeding. More to come.

Delphinium is blooming (blue), between peas and strawberries (above). Pea pods are forming. Snap peas ready for picking and shelling peas in process. Snow Peas are near the top of the 5 foot fence, beyond the chicken wire. Homesteader/Lincoln Peas are about half the height of the fence. I have read these are a dwarf variety of shelling pea that came out in 1908.

Summer Solstice

Neighbour's Mountain Ash in bloom. Still some berries left from last year. Birds must be holding out for the strawberries!

Above, L to R: Brussels Sprouts, Spinach, Lovage, Peas (behind). Lovage is now nearly 4 feet tall and is starting to bloom. I'm guessing now is a good time to start harvesting it, but not exactly sure how best to do this i.e. How much to harvest at once? Cut off flowers or let bloom and go to seed? Etc.

Plus the tomatoes (above). Plants where flowers were plucked off before transplanting now starting tomatoes up to about 1 to 2 cm diameter. Other tomatoes up to ~7 cm on plant with previously non-plucked flowers.

Tenergreen Improved Bush Bean planted May 16 on each side of pathway. They look a little yellow, not sure if that's normal? Behind beans: Bloomsdale Spinach planted May 16 and Fordhook Giant Swiss Chard planted May 2.

Summary of approximate germination % with direct seeding in garden:

• Marigolds 10 - 20% (seed gathered from mom's garden)
• Fordhook Giant Swiss Chard 90-100%
• Bloomsdale Spinach 80%
• Cherry Belle Radish 70%
• Green Arrow Peas (planted Apr 11) 0%
• Oregon Sugar Pod II Snow Peas (planted May 3) 70-80%
• Homesteader/Lincoln Peas (planted May 3) 70-80%
• Carrots (planted May 2) 10-20% (from free package, didn't expect much)
• Tendergreen Improved Bush Beans 80%

This summary is not very accurate for small seeds planted densely together (such as spinach, swiss chard, carrots, radishes, etc), in which case the % has more to due with the gaps in rows than actual % seed germination. Just a rough observation for future reference.

Radish & Oregano Harvest

Cherry Belle Radish planted April 11, havesting 3 to 5 per week. Radishes are just starting to show chew marks from creatures below, so it's a good time to get to them first! Radishes are rich in ascorbic acid (Vit. C, antioxidant), folic acid (Vit. B9), and potassium. They are also a good source of vitamin B6, riboflavin (vit. B2), magnesium, copper, and calcium, among other minerals and vitamins. California Poppies behind radishes (in above photo).

Bubbles Brussels Sprouts transplanted May 5 (above). Not sure when or how to havest these. Advice welcome!

Fordhook Giant Swiss Chard (lower left) planted May 2 and Homesteader Peas (upper left) planted May 3. Planted Tendergreen Improved Bush Beans May 28 (upper right, just off photo) where Green Arrow Peas planted April 11 did not come up (planted too early). These beans are just coming up (June 21).

Oregano and radish harvest!

Heat Wave

With south and west winds blowing all week, the leaves and flowers have come out in full force (+20 C highs, +10 C lows on average). The rain barrels have run dry. So this week required City water as backup for germinating seedlings sown directly in the garden. This is a new experiment with a lot more direct seeding this year than previous years. The heat may have scorched some, and the previous cold weather rotted others, as the germination in general is poor. Next year the plan is to start more inside and transplant as this has proven to be more successful for most plants.

Most of the Green Arrow Peas planted directly in the garden April 11 have not come up. This is not surprising as this was an early planting and warm weather was delayed this spring. They likely rotted before the soil warmed up enough. Three of the four Dwarf Green Curled Kale planted directly in the garden April 11 came up but one has been mowed down by some hungry critter (cabbage butterflies?). The other two are about 1 cm tall with some munching on those as well. Kale definitely seems to do better as a transplant (or perhaps planting directly in garden at a later date?).

The California Poppies (above) thrive in the warm weather.

Fordhook Giant Swiss Chard (above) planted May 2 makes progress, currently at the four-leaf stage. It has had the best germination of all seeds planted directly in the garden this year. Peas are seen behind the Swiss Chard in the photo.

Tomatoes up to about 5 cm diameter! This is the one plant that flowered inside from which the flowers were not plucked off.

Oregano transplanted this week from inside. Planted indoors March 7.

Strawberries growing strong, transplanted from neighbours patch May 2.

Raspberries transplanted from aunt & uncle's garden May 24 with Violet tagging along on the journey.

Cherry Belle Radish (above) planted directly in garden April 11. About 70% germination overall, 20% mowed down, 50% remaining. Sparse seed spacing so didn't need much thinning (but also some gaps in rows).

Rhubarb thrives in the warm weather with no care needed. Raspberry (bottom left of above photo) transplanted May 24 growing strong. Two of the five raspberry transplants are wilting, likely did not get enough of the roots.

April Update

Spring is late, as we all know. My garden journal from last year records the rhubarb coming up by April 15. No sign of it yet this year. I'm guessing it may not come up until the end of April or early May. Last weekend was nice and warm, so I planted (outside in the garden) some Green Arrow Peas, Dwarf Green Curled Kale, and Cherry Belle Radish. Hopefully they'll come up sometime before July! With the cool spring there is risk they may rot before coming up, but I couldn't resist the urge to give them a chance to try. My seed stock has grown too big anyway, so may as well use them up.

Below is an update on the indoor plants:

Prairie Pride Tomatoes & Southport White Globe Onions, early April.

"Salad Bowl" Lettuce, slowing down but still growing.

Plumeria showing some growth at top. It really perked up when I put it outside in the sun last weekend.


Tomatoes & Onions, mid-April. I'm thinking I may have to transplant the tomatoes to 4L pails before transplanting outside!


Oregano (planted around February, I think). Growing slow and steady.


Southport White Globe Onions. Flimsy but alive. Not sure if I should eventually harvest them or transplant outside. We'll see if they can wait that long.


Cilantro at flowering stage (planted end of December '08). I'll harvest the seeds (Coriander), dry them and grind them for the spice rack along with the plant leaves that remain. They seem to dry well in a paper bag in the cupboard (out of the light).

August 2008

Last photos of the season that I forgot to post. The sunflowers eventually got too big and fell over (lots of rain, wet soil, shallow roots likely cause). But we had a wonderful continual harvest of Kale and Swiss Chard from early August into early October or so. The swiss chard slowed down in October, but remained green and alive until early December! (we had a warmer than average fall). The radishes did not do well this year but most everything else did.

Our neighbour confessed to throwing some of her red poppy seed pods into our garden to add some colour, which was very thoughtful. From left to right in photo above: tomatoes, broccoli (swiss chard and carrots behind), peas climbing fence, and lovage (lighter green).

That's all until next year!

Early July 2008

The June rainy season winds down and with more sun the plants begin to grow noticeably more. All have been well taken care of while on vacation by neighbours and friends.

Kale, broccoli, cauliflower, volunteer sunflowers from birdseed (not sure what kind yet. Any guesses?).


Norland Potatoes.


Volunteer sunflowers in compost pile.

Tomatoes, peas, carrots, swiss chard.

Rhubard showing some hail damage. Several hail storms with pea-sized hail this year, but most plants survived and recovered. Also purple beans (Royal Burgundy) around rhubard, snow peas and broccoli.

Spring is sprung - May

Broccoli, Cauliflower, Peas, Swiss Chard, Carrots, Radishes

Plant's eye view (L to R: Peas, swiss chard, carrots)

Rhubarb, broccoli

Mystery compost plants (squash??)

2007 in Review - July

The following posts are a true "blog" in the sense that they are a "web-log" of the past year of gardening (i.e. electronic garden journal), mostly for my personal reference since I forget easily what we planted in previous years and for any others who may be interested. 2007 was our second year at the house, we didn't take many photos in 2006 since we didn't have much garden space at that time.

Spaghetti Squash (Cucurbita pepo) which grew out of the compost from seeds of the discarded innards of a Spaghetti Squash which we bought from Co-op that we ate during winter (ate the squash, composted the innards, not vice versa). The squash's parent was grown in Mexico, so we were surprised to see it grow here! The flowers made great salad or stir fry additions. For the latter you can batter and fry. It did grow some squash, though they were mostly small and did not ripen completely before the first major frosts at the end of August and early September, but we still ate them anyway. In the end we harvested more flowers than squash! The flowers kept popping up every couple of days all summer.

Smooth Brome (Bromus ramosus ssp. racemosus) in the back alley. We are thinking to try planting some raspberries here.

Unknown Mystery Flower that came with the property. Any guesses?

Potatoes (store-bought from Co-op), we didn't eat them in time so into the garden they went. A struggling paper birch (Betula papyrifera) behind dying a slow death due to my destruction of it's roots in the above garden expansion.


Mystery flowers, peppers, and spaghetti squash attacking the baby stroller.


Spinach (left), rhubarb and snow peas climbing in the back.


New garden expansion, ready for next year.

Front flower bed with several donations from family.

Left to right:

"Silver King Sage" or Artemesia ludoviciana

Common Yarrow or Achillea millefolium (native to Alberta)
"The Pearl" or Achillea ptarmica (aka Sneezewort)

The Purple one is "Clustered Bellflower" or Calmpanula glomerata

I'd like to plant more plants native to the Alberta prairies, so far only Common Yarrow is native, though even that is likely a hybrid subspecies derivation from the actual native Yarrow. For now we are planting veggies in the back and flowers and shrubs in the front.