Peanuts - advice wanted

I'm seriously considering planting a small patch of peanuts, but don't  know where to start.  Can I plant fresh-in-shell nuts?   What do they need for a good crop?  How much water do they need? (Drought here at present, but fingers crossed, it usually rains at Easter.  Any help appreciated, Thanks.

Where in the world are you? Instructions may depend on your location. I have had terrible luck with peanuts. One of the nearby ag departments claim only one variety will grow here. Maybe TN Valencia? Mike knows. Gotta dig up his post... I have not tried the correct variety yet.

I'll also try peanuts for the first time this year, but it's a longshot. Not much chance that we get enough summer heat on the Norwegian coast...

I don't know if you do Facebook, but a guy I follow over there grows peanuts in northern Indiana, USA. You might glean some useful stuff looking through his writings: https://www.facebook.com/profile/100007503301179/search/?q=peanuts

We have intended to plant peanuts for years and they seem to drop off the list as things get busy in the spring.

I thought they needed sandy soil and heat at least but beyond that I don't know anything so will be interested in following your thread.

I have one peanut (two seeds) of unknown variety in my grab bag mix from Going to Seed so want to do it right and grow a few seeds to plant for next year.

Peanuts are grown commercially in this area, so I know it's possible. (6b, sandy loam)

I know you should buy seed peanuts. William Dam sells some. I tried a few years ago in the old place but it was clay and they didn't thrive.

It's on my list to try in another year or so. I'm focusing on getting the rest of the trees in and a bunch more perennials going this year.

Where in the world are you?

 Joylynn asked -
Southern Australia - plenty hot enough, but I suspect I might have to baby them with the water, since they grow by the paddock load in Queensland.
Thanks for all the pointers folks, I'll see how it goes - have to wait for the season to change.

I was able to grow a nice patch a few years ago here in central NC. The only problem here is the clay. They do great in sandy soil which I didn’t have. I did have plenty of compost piles at the time and decided to just grow in a couple of those. They did magnificent and were easy to harvest. Just don’t try to eat them right after harvest. They’re pretty nasty. 😂

Have tried in SW Ontario (which is margninal for having enough heat). From that, I'd say it's been critical to find good varieties with really short season. So if you try using peanuts that aren't specifically for seed and don't know where they were grown, they may be selected for conditions very different from yours.

Other than that, what I know is that they need fairly soft/loose soil (sandy is supposed to be good) because they pollinate above ground and then dive underground ("pegging") to set the nuts.

When saving seed, I believe they keep viability best in the shell, so shell them just before planting.

Jill Dyer wrote:I'm seriously considering planting a small patch of peanuts, but don't  know where to start.  Can I plant fresh-in-shell nuts?   What do they need for a good crop?  How much water do they need? (Drought here at present, but fingers crossed, it usually rains at Easter.  Any help appreciated, Thanks.

Last year, I just planted a few in the big planter on the East side. All I did was go to Fleet Farm and buy a big bag of raw peanuts in the shell for birds/ chickens. Good soil: Quite sandy but amended. I pushed them,[about a dozen, just as an experiment] shell and all about 1" under ground. They didn't all come but to tell you the truth, I'm in Zone 4b in Central WI, so it's a bit too far north to get a decent crop by frost time. I just wanted to see if they would grow... at all.
Well, they did but they would have gotten more out of them if I had just taken the 'seed' and run it through the shredder.
Maybe 60% germinated. I got a few pods off of 3-4 plants. They were still a bit soft and my chooks were underwhelmed: they didn't know what to do with them. I had to shell them for them to show any interest.
You don't tell us where you are, Jill, or what kind of soil you have.
Here is someone who tried and Minnesota:
https://northerngardener.org/growing-peanuts-north/
She started them in tiny pots indoors, then transplanted them. They need a looong season and lots of heat. I might try again but I will grow them under plastic tunnels if I do.

I tried peanuts a few years ago, and the plants that the chipmunks allowed to sprout grew well. However, when I went to dig up the new peanuts, I discovered that the chipmunks had beaten me to them. If you want to grow them, but have chipmunks or squirrels, you are going to need a way to keep them out of your patch

The problem I had was everything likes to eat them before they even get to bloom.   Perhaps why I see videos of Asians growing them in bags of soil on a high shelf.

I am in NSW Australia and plant peanuts regularly as I love them raw straight from the garden and dry roasted.

I'm in a temperate climate, my area covers Zones 4-9 USA.

I find interplanting them with lettuce, silverbeet, bush beans, carrots, near the foot of climbing cucumbers, or marigolds where they aren't overshadowed helps maximise yields.

Best results are when soil temperatures reach 18C/64F, they need warmth to get a good start. My first lot over 40 years ago I planted from peanuts in the shell. These days you can buy packs of peanuts in the shells. Seeds really must remain in their shells until just before you plant or they dry out very quickly and fail to produce. I have only bought new ones a couple of times since then because they always have re-seeded from ones I have missed.

I usually get between 35-50 pods per plant here with 2-3 peanuts per pod, which should give you an idea of how many to plant.

If seed saving,  brush the shells free of dirt-DON'T wash them. Store in a cool, dark place until next growing season, not in a hot kitchen or garage as heat will decrease germination.

I store mine in glass jars so no beasties can get into them. My neighbours keep me in jars, and I share some of the peanuts, they have all been amazed at how yummy raw nuts are compared to store bought.

I always think I have harvested them every year, but the next season I find some I've missed where seedlings have come up on their own-I love freebies.

I live in West Virginia, zone 6. I started growing peanuts because my neighbor had success with them. He had sandy soil and I have clay soil --well-modified clay soil--and I have success almost every year with peanuts. I've never planted them as soon as it;s warm enough to do so--I use them to follow onions or garlic which I harvest about July 1. Usually I plant Tennessee Red Valencia, which has shorter day-requirements than most--but i like the peanuts too. I did try Schronce's black the first year, and they did fine but I switched because I often mix roasted peanuts with raisins, a 50/50 mix, and it's easier to adjust that when the peanuts stand out from the black raisins. I get the seed from Southern Exposure Seed Exchange, which has good selections of southern things like peanuts, collards, dent corn and blackeyed peas. They need some water but this has not usually been a problem for me--we typically get 40 inches of rain a year, fairly evenly distributed. There were three years I got no crop--twice it was because of rabbits, which I find go for any kind of bean (except black-eyed peas) before anything else; I now have 16": of one-inch-mesh chickenwire around the bottom of the garden fence. The other year it was because I was using my own saved seed and that year--or rather the previous one--I had jarred up the seed too soon and it fermented. I dry the plants in my attached greenhouse, and toss every tenth pod in a separate bowl for seed saving--that way I have seed from most plants but disproportionately more from the most productive ones. You can't plant seeds still in the pod, but you should not remove the papery skin before planting.
Bottom line--you don't have to have sandy soil or live in the deep south to be successful with peanuts, but if your growing season is shorter than 110 days it might be iffy.

I grow peanuts every year in 7b, NC, in the upper garden (I have two sizeable patches protected from deer, above the bull pasture and down by the side) where I've worked the soil for a while. Otherwise it's red clay and mostly rock. They do well and I often get volunteers in the old section as I move them around year to year, replenishing soil in my crop rotation. We had a rotten drought last year at just the wrong time but I got maybe 5# off 6-8 plants anyway.

I originally got a packet of "seed" peanuts years ago, probably from Southern Exposure but that's just a guess. I decided to grow Carolina African as one of the most flavorful and obviously suited to my location, and also usually a few of a different kind, much bigger black ones (name lost in the mists of time). Once you grow them, just save your own seed to get more of what does well in your location.

However - they do need a fairly long growing season. Even here I usually start them weeks before last frost. They need the ground to be pretty warm before you put them out, and they get big fast (relative to something like a tomato), so plan ahead. I find they're quite reliable, though.

If you have a good dry spell, you can harvest and just leave them on the ground to cure in Indian summer heat. I usually hang the whole bush in my small greenhouse (sauna) and separate the nuts later, but I find they're a super easy and no-fuss crop.