Growing Peanuts In My Garden

After I have harvested the sweet potatoes leaves, the big round earthen pot with its soil has been left as it was because I have not thought of what to plant yet.

One morning while watering my plants, an idea came to me. Maybe I could try planting peanuts in this pot. I have tried growing peanuts in the ground before and the harvest was very good. So I searched in my refrigerator and found some store bought peanuts and soaked them for a few hours. I then used a stick to poke holes in the soil and in each hole, I dropped in 2 peanuts and lightly covered up the holes.

After daily watering and keeping the soil moist, the peanuts started to sprout.

 Peanuts belong to the Legume family. Scientific name is Arachis Hypogaea.

Peanuts grow well in light sandy soil.

Peanuts need warm weather to grow well and yield good harvest.

Peanuts need about 4 to 5 months for the legumes to ripen.

The leaves of peanuts have 4 leaflets.

If it is harvested too early, the seeds in the legume will not be well formed.

 With the extra peanuts I also planted them in this medium sized pot.
The harvest from this pot was totally nil!

Looking out for the first bloom.

Finally, the first blooms appeared! The flower is bright golden yellow.

Once pollinated, and after the flowers have faded, the elongated flower stalk with a slightly swollen tip, grow downward and pushed into the soil to develop into legume pods.

The peanut branches are growing taller and longer until they started to droop over the pot. The pot is not big enough for the fruiting of legume pods.

 Normally the branches will fall onto the ground for the flower stalk to push into the soil. But due to lack of space, they are drooping over the side of the pot.

For those flower stalks which were unable to touch the soil, they formed legume pods outside as shown in this photo.  

Each legume pod will normally contains from 1 to 4 seeds.

The peanut patch were getting really untidy but I need to wait until 5 months to harvest.

Reached 5 months, hoping to get some harvest. I gently loosened the soil and pulled out plant by plant. Even though the legume pods may not be very big, I did have a small amount of harvest. At least my time and effort were not wasted.

Peanuts and its many uses:-

• Peanuts can be eaten raw.
• Peanuts as salted peanuts, peanut candy bars, peanut butter, peanut butter cookies, roasted shelled peanuts, deep fried shelled peanuts.
• Boiled peanuts with the shell in brine.
• Peanut oil for cooking.
• Dry roasted peanut with the shell and etc.

I managed to get this amount from the harvest, enough for hubby and myself. I boiled these in brine and eat them as snack while watching the TV.
Anything home grown always taste sweeter.

Now as for you, dear brothers

who are waiting for the Lord's return, be patient,

like a farmer who waits until the autumn

for his precious harvest to ripen.

Yes, be patient.

And take courage, for the coming of the Lord is near.

(James 5:7-8, TLB)