Organic Northern Hardy Valencia Peanut
Description
HEIRLOOM Yes you heard it right, a northern hardy peanut! And if we can grow peanuts, so can you! Even in containers.
Regional adaptation is important for every seed to thrive, few so crucially as peanuts. We were gifted a few handfuls of these ‘Northern Hardy Valencias’ from a family from Michigan’s Upper Peninsula when Fruition began and, skeptical as we were, they were impressively abundant and incredibly fun to grow. The family had been saving only the most abundant pods from the most abundant plants for over ten years and WOW. We knew regional adaptation makes all the difference…little did we know!
You’ll notice your packet will be quite large and bulky: we send your Organic Northern Hardy Valencia Peanuts in their shell to preserve each seed’s freshness. Remove them from the shell just before you plant them, taking care to not knick the protective red skin.
Peanuts grow as tall and wide as bush beans, making them suitable for small gardens, even large containers. Sow them when you sow your bush beans, after the last frost; early June is average for us. Well-drained, fertile soil with the additional warmth of a layer of row cover yields the most abundant peanuts. Pay close attention to their gorgeous canary yellow flowers: blossoming within a few inches of the ground, each pollinated flower will grow a purple stem (called a peduncle or peg) down into the soil where it forms each peanut beneath the earth.
At the end of the season, your peanut stems will have 20+ purple peduncles connecting your peanuts to each plant! Organic Northern Hardy Valencia Peanut continues to mature all season long so we harvest at first frost by forking around each plant gently and lifting the peanuts out of the soil still attached to the plant. The pods with 4 and 5 peanuts we’ll dry & cure for our seed stock; all the other peanuts we boil or roast fresh and enjoy right away. Our favorite is to boil them in salty beer!
Sow Seeds & Sing Songs,
& the whole Fruition Crew
Tom (verified owner) –
Germination percentage was low, only about 20%.
Will update at the end of the growing season on results.
Maddie –
We are grateful for you sharing your reflections with us and the Fruition community, and truly sorry to hear that you haven’t found abundance and delight in this experience. Apologies that we are just now getting you a reply — we are responding to a backlog in product reviews, and iterating our teamwork to ensure we are consistently and quickly responding with care to reviews, now and in seasons to come. We appreciate your patience alongside your feedback!
Seeds are sensitive beings, and we love sharing some of the steps we take to try to provide seed that is ready to germinate: we flag for review any variety or seed lot that does not reach 90% in a germination test (although legal minimums for selling seed are sometimes as low as 45%!). Our tests are handled by a 3rd party that specializes in germination testing. The vast majority of our varieties never have any issue reaching that 90% threshold. If need be, we take care to re-winnow lots, or overpack packets to help provide the foundation for your garden to grow abundantly. Peanuts can be tricky in part because their seed skins are so delicate and they won’t germinate if those skins are damaged at any point before sprouting. I can see from your other comment it seems like in this case we may have been overpacking to try to compensate, though 20% is very low and I’m planning to flag this for others on the team to look into.
In any case – surrounding you with beauty and abundance is why we do what we do– one way or another, we would love to see you find more delight this season! We will be reaching out to you directly by email to joyfully provide you with a coupon for a free packet of seed. Please feel free to read our Satisfaction Guarantee and email support@fruitionseeds.com should you wish to reach out any time in the future. Thanks for growing with us!
And p.s.! Friends, while we are on the subject, for anyone reading who may be finding challenges with getting your peanuts to sprout, we invite you to check out our “”Planting peanuts”” video here for tips — including making sure you don’t knick those sensitive delicate seed-skins.
Tom D (verified owner) –
I grew these last season. The germination rate was low. Fruition warned that may be the case and included extra seeds in my order.
The plants grew well in spite of the dry conditions in my 5B garden.
I harvested about a pound of peanuts from the 20 plants. Will plant again this summer from saved seeds.
This is more a curiosity than a crop in our Finger Lakes region.
Maddie –
Thanks for the update, Tom! I’m curious to see how your germination goes this season — thanks for growing with us, and especially for saving these seeds =).
Geoffrey Syme (verified owner) –
29/32 seeds have germinated after three weeks, for a 91% germination rate. Next step will be to move them outside in about a week.
Melissa Knox –
HI Geoffrey, so glad to hear of your fantastic germination rate!
Thanks for growing with us!
Melissa