I'm pretty far North & expect nothing below the mid-40's F. for the next 10 days... you must be really far North. ;-) As others have commented above, you can harvest cowpeas (including blackeyes) either green or dry. If the pods have begun to change color or wither, you could pull those pods to dry... but it might be better to just harvest them green & shell out those with expanded pods. The shelled beans can be used fresh, or blanched & frozen. Young, immature pods can be used as snaps. In the future, there are short DTM cowpeas which are more likely to mature in short-season areas. MN 13 (which I grew this year) and MN 150 are true-bush cowpeas, bred to mature in Minnesota. If you want to grow longer-season cowpeas (including blackeyes) you might want to consider starting them as transplants. I start climbing cowpeas & yardlong beans as transplants every year, with consistently good results.

I am a new member to gw and hope I am not intruding here but Wow! We are attempting this exact same thing right now. We moved to 82 acres of sand and sage brush just over a year ago and are starting with absolutly nothing but what we brought with us and can provide or build on our own. We are 38 miles from the edge of town and we are 100 percent off grid. We have no address, so no fire , police, or medical services of any kind out here. When we moved here our plans were to gradually build up to a self sustaining life style over a period of a few years. We had a savings and job options all lined up. Instaed, the economy tanked and I lost any hope of working due to my health. We were kind of forced to decide on the spot if we realy wanted to do this or if we were going to go back to the city. We decide this realy is what we want to do and have been sticking to it. We haul water, we are building solar panels, have a very small geni for night time power and heat with scavaenged wood and use straw for insulation for both us and the animals. It took a full year for my partner to find any kind of work at all we lived off of saving and my tiny disability income until then and now most of his pay goes for fuel to get to work(79 miles round trip every day) . I was not able to get a pair of goats until Aug 25th of last year. We still need two more does so that we can keep a clean heard of 3-5 goats going at all times for both meat and milk. We have chickens ( the first thing we put out here, Reds, Amercanas,Siklies, and Bantoms) as well as Ducks and Pheasant. We plan on Turkeys and Geese this year. We also plan on rabbits in the future ( the new zelands )but have a large wild population to hunt for now. We will be saving for American Guinea Hogs and Irish Dexter Cattle. If we must, we will do a Dexter / Jersy cross for the cattle. We only want the smaller heiratige breads of the larger livestock since they are much nicer to the land ( I can comfortably range 3-5 dexters on the same amount of land as 1 of the standard breads of cattle and that 3-5 animals is all we will need ) and they can comfortably handle our major temp swings with out health issues. I only managed a small experimental bed last year. It was to see if I could grow all of the things that the folks here has major dificulty with since they are some of the mainstays in most home gardens (tomatoes , peppers, beans, greens, and mushrooms ). With a lot of creative gardening , it worked. So this year will be my first real garden attempt. A large percentage of what others have posted is on our list of things to plant or grow. This is not an all inclusive list but we have also added things Quinoa , flax , sorgums, sunchokes, sunflowwers, barley, oats, rye, buck wheat, soybeans, alfalfa, millet, wheat and clover ( because all of these they are good for both human and animal consumption). Most of these things can be grow together because they devolpe and mature at different times, many are symbiotic relationship plants ( think 3 sisters planting,like corn, beans and squash in the same bed), and they also build and maintaining the soil. We have not yet aquired most of these but hope to soon. They provide food crops and fodder crops at different stages so the production is double duty. With carefull and selective harvesting and seed saving we can set aside next years crop of some of the anuals like the buck wheat. We have plans on a small orchard and I received a gift of a few nut trees for birthday ( 2 hazel nuts a pecan and an almond) and they should arive in june. We will also try to take advantage of the native plants to incourage the continued diversity of wild life we have out here. If the Fox, Cyotes ,hawks,eagles, mountain lions , badgers and other bigger preditor types have an ample food sources, our animals are less attractive to them. We also get better polination , and bug controls. I am an experianced gardener but not in this zone 5 and with these kind of temp swings ( We are alpine high desert with -5 to -15 in the winter , 100 plus regularly in the summer and a last frost date of june 10 ). I can tell you it will be a challenge to everything you think you know. So, Thank you, Your efforts do not just benefit those you seek to help but also some of us at home. I wish you the best of luck with your experiment and will follow your post for any lessons you may be able pass on.

Paula, All southern peas are true heat-lovers and perform best if planted in really warm soil and after daytime and nighttime air temperatures are staying consistently warm. (i.e. not in the upper 30s with frost on the blades of grass! lol) Technically, you can plant them anytime your soil temperature at planting depth is at about 65 degrees for at least 3 straight days. I like to wait for it to hit 70 though. Seed planted early tends to just sit there and germinate slowly, and seed planted in cool soil tends to give you weak plants that are prone to damping off. Because all southern peas (crowders, blackeyes, pinkeye puprplehulls, lady, cream, etc.) love heat, I use them as a succession planting for cool-season veggies like broccoli or lettuce or onions. I don't think I've ever planted them in April, and only rarely in May because my garden is too full of cool-season stuff then. Spacing depends on how you grow them. If you are growing them in single rows, space the peas 2" apart and the rows 24" apart. If you want to waste less space on pathways, plant a double or triple row, with 1' between rows and maybe 4" to 6" (last year I used 12" and could have halved it) in between the plants. Some southern peas are bush types, some are vining and some are semi-vining. There are many types of pinkeye purplehulls and some of them are semivining and some are bushy. If your seed envelope from the swap says pinkeye purplehull and doesn't say 'knuckle' or 'BVR', then they probably are the semivining ones because they're probably the plain old every day pinkeye purplehull. They grow like half runners...upward 12-18" or so and then sometimes they go off on a wild, horiontal tangent. Sometimes they sort of vine and wrap around one another a little bit. However, if there is a row of tomato cages in the adjacent row or raised bed, they've been known to reach across the pathway, grab hold of a cage, and climb it to the top. It is odd how they do that. This year I might plant them right next to our 7' tall fence just to see if they would climb it. I bet they would. Plant lots of them. Lots and lots and lots. No matter how many you plant, they are so good fresh that you'll wish you had planted more. If you've never grown purplehulls, here's a tip: pick them when the hulls are purple. Not a little purple, not kind of purple, but fully purple. I'm going to link the Pinkeye Purplehull Festival website. On that site you'll find all sorts of cool stuff, including growing information and recipes. If you've ever wanted to make purplehull jelly, the recipe is on this website. Disclaimer: I am not responsible if your DH or anyone else's DH sees this website and decides they want to enter the rotary tiller races. Dawn Here is a link that might be useful: Purplehull Festival and Rotary Tiller Race

I received my box from Faye today and wow! what a large box she sent stuffed full of goodies! I love everything she sent which included a beautiful tin "welcome" sign with flowers and a dragonfly, a darling patriotic cottage style windchime, a large pack of seed bags,plant ties,post it notes, sharpie markers, glitter glue, garden gloves, hand lotion, an "Outdoor Favorites Recipe Book" which my husband confiscated already, a great variety of wonderful candy and bouncing balls for the grandkids (they're gonna love them), and a bunch of different garden seeds which I can't wait to plant. And last but not least, the cutest card with an adorable puppy and kitty on the front with a surprise amazon MP3 gift card inside so I can purchase download my own favorite music! Perfect! I adore everything, but my favorite is the patriotic cottage style windchime! It matches my house style just right and how cute! You sent too much Faye. Everything is greatly appreciated. I would have chosen the same things if I were buying it for myself! You are such a great gardening friend! So thoughtful! Thank you, thank you, thank you! Sue N.