If you want a second planting of peas, you should start about 10 or 11 weeks before your first expected frost. For zone 5, we still have a few weeks.

If you would like to plant anything else, you have to check the date to maturity to see if it will fit in your growing season. Beans would probably also work. Keep in mind that they might grow slower when it starts to get cooler, except for things like peas that like cool weather.

All the pods are edible. If you pick them when they're still small, then you could use them as snap peas (the kind you find in oriental foods). But if he likes them, then I say let him have it. Composting is probably the next best alternative though.

or maybe try some beans...they are easy to grow and don't take very long to reach maturity...

Did you plant the peas early enough for your region? Check with your state's Extension Service. Each county should have it's own Cooperative Extension Office which provides free publications and information for the asking. They will have valuable vegetable/gardening tables available specifically for your area determined by universities and horticultural research scientists who have collected data from growing those crops in your state. Your tax dollars are already paying for this service so you may as well get some use out of it.

Vegetable Planting and Planning Calendar for Missouri (download the pdf) complete with spring and fall planting dates (underneath the spring planting dates for appropriate crops), how much to plant per person, etc. They can also tell you the average last frost date for your area and ideal planting times for specific crops and varieties in your area.

See how detailed this example is:

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Here is an excerpt of yield per person:
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Cateyanne, peas are wonderful veggies but produce at a very low yield. Don't be disappointed - next time, plant more!

Snap peas seem like the most significant garden crop developed in my lifetime. I don't believe I'm overstating it, they are just great! Yield is significantly higher since they are used at a later stage of maturity than snow peas and the pod is consumed along with the pea seed (right off the vines, raw - as often as not ;o).

The link below gives you some idea of the yield of various vegetables. I wish that they would break it down for the 3 common types of garden pea but think of it this way, 100 feet for 20 pounds to 4 tons an acre of snap peas (according to Oregon State U ;o).

For replanting right now, I'd go with ruthieG's suggestion of a quick crop of green beans. Beans are as close to a "sure bet" as I can get as a 2nd crop.

If your husband is willing to eat shell peas, pods and all - he'd probably looove the tender tendrils of the pea plants. I cannot grow peas to maturity in the Fall because of the rapid cool-down in my part of the world. But, as they approach and reach flowering, the final 6 - 10 inches of the vines are tender and sweet. Very good in salads and stir-fries.

Steve

Here is a link that might be useful: Seed Useage Yield Chart

In zone 5 you still have time to plant: late cucumbers, late summer squash, summer or fall lettuces, turnips, rutabagas, beets, carrots, Asian radishes, Asian greens, kale, collards, late beans.

I am in southern CT (Z6) and I planted 3 plantings of peas this spring. The first was Wando that I planted in early April. That planting is finished now. Out of one small bag of seed we had 3 meals for my wife & myself and I froze a quart. My 2nd planting is a snow pea variety and is now bearing. Some of them are already too big to eat as snow peas, so I'll just let the peas develop and shell them. My 3rd planting is a shell variety that is just now blooming. They have been much slower because it was already pretty warm by the time I got them in.
John A

This may come too late but if the pea plants are still there cut them off rather than pulling them up as the roots have nitrogen fixing nodules on them which, if left in the ground, will help fertilise your soil as they rot.

Thanks Flora. Good suggestion.
John A

I pulled my Sugar Sprint pea plants after a very good harvest. Got a huge initial burst of peas, then a smallish second flush. After that the vines just looked too fried and weren't producing enough to justify the space they were occupying (an entire 3 by 8 raised bed). So I pulled them and planted broccoli for (hopefully) a Fall crop, as well as kohlrabi (my first try with this) and spinach chard, green wave mustard, and radishes. I like all of these crops. Radishes give me a hard time, but you've gotta keep trying again and again in different locations. There's always something you can plant when you yank a drop that has finished up. Good luck and enjoy your garden.