Champion of England

Thursday, 10 September 2009 12:50

Champion of England, originally introduced in 1843 as Fairbeard's Champion of England was much prized throughout the 19th century for its superior vigour and flavour, and became very popular in Canada and the US too. It was bred by William Fairbeard, a nurseryman in Teynham, Kent, who was a highly respected pea specialist of his day. Indeed Charles Darwin wrote to him in 1855 asking for information about cross-pollination and inherited traits in pea varieties, as part of his research for Natural Selection. Darwin had obviously spotted that most plants decline in vigour if they're inbred for too many generations but that peas are one of the few plants that don't suffer from this phenomenon. Even today it's not completely understood, but it's known to be a genetic function, the opposite of hybrid vigour, and is called inbreeding depression. Peas don't succumb to inbreeding depression because they're natural inbreeders, designed to self-pollinate. Their flowers are fully enclosed and pollen is shed directly onto the stigma before the buds have even opened. So even when two varieties are grown together they are unlikely to mingle. Fairbeard told Darwin that accidental cross-pollination between pea varieties was so rare that he didn't take any special precautions to stop it, which confirmed what Darwin had noticed in his own garden. Several decades later peas played a crucial part in the discovery of genetics. Fairbeard introduced several other acclaimed pea varieties which have slipped into obscurity or extinction. Once it gets going, Champion of England is fairly typical of an old-fashioned gardener's pea. It's very tall, easily reaching 6 or 7 feet, and quite slender and elegant. The leaves have whitish silver markings, as peas often do. The flowers are elegant and a pale creamy white. Then you get long, long pods, green and slightly scimitar shaped with about 8 or 9 average-sized peas in each. Champion of England is a rare variety and not commercially available in the UK at the moment, although ironically it seems readily available in North America. It's over 160 years old and was very popular and well known in its heyday, which lasted until the early 20th century. As was its breeder, William Fairbeard, who ran a nursery in the Kent village of Teynham and was a very well respected pea man of his day, introducing several other commercially successful varieties (not all of which have survived). Go to table of pea varieties