2021 Little Easy Bean Network - Bean Lovers Come Discover Something New !

[jbosmith]

Only getting a few notifications here too.

Part of my 2021 pole beans. While all but 3 were disappointing, in most cases there is at least enough seed to save for next time.

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"Bert Goodwin", weak climber, good as snap or shelly (I prefer the shelly). From Will Bonsall in 2007. This one was grown in the well-drained garden next to my garage, so was less affected by the heavy rains. It produced only slightly less than the 2015 grow out, 29 ounces.

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"Brita's Foot Long", pole dry. Sent to me by an SSE member in 2006, but I believe originally from Salt Spring Seeds, Canada. Long pods turn tan when dry, with 8-9 beans. Normally one of my most productive dry beans; but this year, only 2 plants survived the flooding. Those two plants still produced 7 ounces of seed, hopefully enough to share until grown again.

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"Budapest II", pole ____ ? A new trial, obtained from SSE in 2015, but not grown until this year. I had observed it growing on Heritage Farm during a visit, and all pods were dry on September 2nd, so I thought it might be a good short-season pole dry bean. Because of the seed age, I planted it in my large "TLC" pots; germination was still about 100%. Tall vines. The snaps were OK, but small. The pods dried down in 85-90 days, after which some vines put on a second set. Initially the seeds were a beautiful golden color, but they are darkening to brown. The best dry seed yield I've ever had from the pots, 29 ounces.

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"Brown King #2", pole snap/dry (I prefer it shelly or dry). From SSE in 2015. Moderately strong vines. Snaps unremarkable. Fat buff colored seeds like over-sized Navy beans. Grown in one of the wetter spots in the rural garden, where some plants were lost, and the survivors only sent up one runner. One of the bigger disappointments, since I had planted a 16' row in hope of harvesting shellies to freeze... but enough seed (8 ounces) to replace the older seed.

Will post the remaining 4 varieties tomorrow.

"Bert Goodwin" has a similar appearance to the Johnson beans that got me into dry beans. I've always loved that look.

Are Budapest II tall enough that I would be creating a complete mess if I put them on 5' trellis? Short season pole beans always catch my attention for the zone 3 gardens.

 

[jbosmith]

they're down about a foot.

Mine too but they don't seem to care. I'm always tempted to try to turn them into houseplants but I mostly save that honor for sprouting avocados seeds. I usually just ignore them and let nature run its course but a month ago I had so many that I took a pair of scissors to the bin and the residents had bean sprouts for a snack.

I've started putting pieces of pizza boxes on the surface of mine as it keeps down the volunteers and also seems to make the stuff on the surface more accessible to both fungus and worms. This is one of my shorter bins but this bean was pushing at the lid when I opened it last night. It's hard to tell in the picture but it's maybe 16" long.

 

[HmooseK]

@Zeedman
Budapest II has a nice color to it.

 

[Zeedman]

Are Budapest II tall enough that I would be creating a complete mess if I put them on 5' trellis? Short season pole beans always catch my attention for the zone 3 gardens.

They would probably be OK. I grew them in pots with 6' of trellis, and they went over the top a little; but the vines I originally observed at Heritage Farm were grown on 5' welded wire, and didn't look overly top heavy.

@Zeedman
Budapest II has a nice color to it.

I agree. The semi-gloss seed coat really accents the color, which is brighter when freshly shelled. DW really enjoyed shelling these.

The funny thing is that I try to never grow two varieties of the same color or pattern in the same year, and "Budapest II" is almost exactly the same color as the dry bean "Sargas", which I also grew. Fortunately they were grown in locations 6 miles apart. The shape & seed coat luster are different enough that I could probably separate them if a mix-up occurred.

 

[flowerbug]

Mine too but they don't seem to care. I'm always tempted to try to turn them into houseplants but I mostly save that honor for sprouting avocados seeds. I usually just ignore them and let nature run its course but a month ago I had so many that I took a pair of scissors to the bin and the residents had bean sprouts for a snack.

sometimes i've had to bury sprouts but rarely enough that it bothers me. with the many thousand beans i just buried i doubt i'll see many actually breach the surface.

I've started putting pieces of pizza boxes on the surface of mine as it keeps down the volunteers and also seems to make the stuff on the surface more accessible to both fungus and worms. This is one of my shorter bins but this bean was pushing at the lid when I opened it last night. It's hard to tell in the picture but it's maybe 16" long.


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meant that the beans i put in the buckets are usually buried about a foot deep so they have to fight their way up through that much dirt before they can grow up further. what has normally happened is if the buckets are wet enough those beans buried that deeply will not sprout at all and instead they'll ferment. i don't do super fine control of moisture in the buckets so sometimes they can get a bit wetter than i'd prefer. without any holes to drain liquid from the bottom it means that the only way moisture gets out is evaporation and that can take quite a long time to adjust when the bucket soil is mulched. i've had some really swampy buckets and the worms don't seem to mind as long as they are not actually swimming through the entire bucket depth. i'll find worms throughout the entire soil layers too even with extra water. it's really interesting that they don't seem to mind. makes for a very heavy bucket though... i try not to get them that wet but, well, stuff happens...

cardboard is something that worms seem to enjoy as it isn't bleached paper and it has a lot of gaps between the layers that the worms can exploit. with using a lot of bean pods recently - i think they are healthier too as they have more fungi and bacterial diversity. the worms seem happy enough with them. that's good because i have a few more bags to use up.

 

[jbosmith]

sometimes i've had to bury sprouts but rarely enough that it bothers me. with the many thousand beans i just buried i doubt i'll see many actually breach the surface.

I like when things sprout. A lot of my coworkers have avocado trees in their office and I often get messages like "Hey, I just watered my avocado and a worm came out!"

meant that the beans i put in the buckets are usually buried about a foot deep so they have to fight their way up through that much dirt before they can grow up further. what has normally happened is if the buckets are wet enough those beans buried that deeply will not sprout at all and instead they'll ferment. i don't do super fine control of moisture in the buckets so sometimes they can get a bit wetter than i'd prefer. without any holes to drain liquid from the bottom it means that the only way moisture gets out is evaporation and that can take quite a long time to adjust when the bucket soil is mulched. i've had some really swampy buckets and the worms don't seem to mind as long as they are not actually swimming through the entire bucket depth. i'll find worms throughout the entire soil layers too even with extra water. it's really interesting that they don't seem to mind. makes for a very heavy bucket though... i try not to get them that wet but, well, stuff happens... '

Oh, you're a far more motivated burier than I am. I bury stuff just under the surface so that fruit flies can't get to it. I share the wet bin problem with you as i use Rubbermaid totes that have all the same problems. The only 'downside' I see is that wet bins seem to mean more red mites but the worms don't seem to mind them so neither do I. I have drain holes but it's rare that anything coms out of them and they're mostly there for aeration. If things get too wet I add coir (which I got a bunch of for free at one point) or old potting soil.

cardboard is something that worms seem to enjoy as it isn't bleached paper and it has a lot of gaps between the layers that the worms can exploit. with using a lot of bean pods recently - i think they are healthier too as they have more fungi and bacterial diversity. the worms seem happy enough with them. that's good because i have a few more bags to use up.

I've been amazed at how fast my worms have been going through my bean pods so thanks again for the nudge to add them. They still have a big paper leaf bag full to go through so I won't be running out anytime soon. I've been putting a layer of them between the castings and the cardboard. Also, speaking of fungus, this was on the bottom of my cardboard this morning.

 

[jbosmith]

What are folks' favorite bush black bean varieties? Every few years I have a row in my community garden plot where I want beans but don't want to shade my neighbors' with pole beans. In the past I've used Manitoba Black here but they do better with support and I'm trying to avoid that. I'm currently thinking Black Turtle Beans but am open to other ideas.

An ideal variety would be something that I can plant in a single, narrow, 30' row, mulch with old hay and forget about until a single harvest in the fall. It doesn't need to be anything rare or with a great story as I probably won't save seed where they're going anyway. The earlier the better due to the insect pressure there.

By the way, I settled on Eclipse - a PVP variety of all things. It was on clearance at the local garden shop and the internets made it sound like fun to try

 

[heirloomgal]

Is it just me, or does every purple podded bean (at the edible stage anyway) - pole or bush - have a beige seed? I realised this year that both Purple Peacock and Blue Coco have identical seeds. Then I looked at Purple Teepee and Purple Queen beans, and while the shape of those is way skinnier and smaller, they are the same colour as PP & BC. I don't think I have a purple podded bean that doesn't have this colour of seed.

Purple Peacock

Blue Coco

Better not mix those 2 up! I don't think there would be any way to tell them apart, even in growth habit.

Othello Pinto. A semi-runner variety. North Star Pinto, a bush, was superior.

Ruckle, a bush bean from BC. I grew it because of the name. Probably much like a Cannellini bush bean.

Early Pinkies bush bean. Another one from BC. It's a new one released this year I think. It was nice, very productive, but the seed wasn't very smooth and they had an orangey quality to them that I didn't expect. I'll try it again sometime since it's worth keeping just for it's high productivity, even if it's not a real beauty.

 

[Blue-Jay]

Is it just me, or does every purple podded bean (at the edible stage anyway) - pole or bush - have a beige seed? I realised this year that both Purple Peacock and Blue Coco have identical seeds. Then I looked at Purple Teepee and Purple Queen beans, and while the shape of those is way skinnier and smaller, they are the same colour as PT & BC. I don't think I have a purple podded bean that doesn't have this colour of seed.

I noticed what you noticed several years ago about purple podded beans and their seed color. It is not just you. It's a real thing. My guess is that purple poddedness and it's seed color are genetically linked. I have even had mottled seed coats come as an outcross from purple pods. Once you plant the outcrossed seed and get more purple podded beans the next season. The seed the plants produce is beige again.

What is amazing is all the different purple podded beans that Robert Lobitz got with all those seeds that look like Blooming Prairie. He didn't get any beige seed. How did that happen?

 

[heirloomgal]

I noticed what you noticed several years ago about purple podded beans and their seed color. It is not just you. It's a real thing. My guess is that purple poddedness and it's seed color are genetically linked. I have even had mottled seed coats come as an outcross from purple pods. Once you plant the outcrossed seed and get more purple podded beans the next season. The seed the plants produce is beige again.

What is amazing is all the different purple podded beans that Robert Lobitz got with all those seeds that look like Blooming Prairie. He didn't get any beige seed. How did that happen?

Oh yah! I forgot about those! That's true, those are purple podded beans too. I completely forgot about that variety. It's a good question isn't it?