Sweet peas

[Grandadwasthatyou]

I am a novice gardener but am really enjoying setting up my back garden. I adore the smell of sweet peas and have planted Latifolius which I have now discovered ( by watching YouTube videos) that they don't really have a smell ( not that they have flowered yet).
If I can get hold of some seedlings online of a highly scented variety is it now too late to plant them?

I think it’s really too late to have much success with sweet peas this year, but if the plug plants are cheap enough you could give it a go.
For next year try Clouds of Scent sweet pea seeds from Sarah Raven, purples and white. Or a pinky purple one called Matucana, which apparently has a strong scent.
You can start the seedings off in a greenhouse in October or wait till spring.

Lathyrus odoratus is the scented species. The older varieties can be relied on for scent, Matucana being one of the best. Others to look out for: Cupani, Dorothy Eckford, Painted lady, Prince Edward of York. Some of the modern varieties have a good scent, but some don't - make sure a strong fragrance is mentioned in the description.

You can sow from seed in the spring, or you can start off in October and keep in an unheated greenhouse over winter - worth doing, in my experience, as long as you have somewhere to keep them over winter. They're annuals, so you will need to sow again each year. Unfortunately nobody yet has managed to breed a perennial sweet pea with a scent.