I have planted sugar snap, super s.s., sugar mel and sugar ann. Sugar snap and super sugar snap are pretty similar, but SSS has more disease resistance, though I've never had an issue with disease in peas. IME they have the best flavor. Sugar Ann is earliest and has shorter vines and good flavor. sugar Mel is less sweet in flavor but has 2 pods at each node, so produces more peas. I have found that there are two ways to deal with cool spring soil, to grow in raise beds so that they warm up earlier or to pre sprout indoors. Once they have sprouted, plant out. They may not grow right away, but they will not rot IME,but will grow as the soil warms. You could also tent the bed with plastic so that it will warm up prior to planting the peas. Johnnys Selected Seeds catalog gives optimal sprouting temps for all their veggie seeds.

I live in central NH, not coastal.

I planted both Sugar Snap and Sugar Ann this year and was pleased with both here in central NH. I thought both stood up well considering the hot weather we had but I planted early after warming the soil with black plastic. I think my first planting date was April 9. I will plant less Sugar Snaps next year and try for a later planting. I grew two pea pod varieties that I didn't like at all. One was an Amish variety that a friend raved about and another was a yellow pod. Perhaps they would have done better if I hadn't planted them so late.

What worked great was using concrete reinforcing mesh as pea fences. They are held in place by metal posts. The sugar snaps probably got 7 ' tall so they needed a strong fence. I should have also tied them up sooner. They don't seem to cling to the fence at all.

In the vicinity of the Sugar Anns I found a couple of struggling plants really late in the season. I think they seeded from dropped pods. I wished I had grown a fall crop of these.

NEXT year!