2024 Little Easy Bean Network - Growing Heirloom Beans Of Today And Tomorrow

[ducks4you]

 

[Blue-Jay]

Conntecticut Wonder - Pole Snap 60 to 70 days. White blossom, green pods. The original steward of Connecticut Wonder Reverend Frank Abbott told his granddaughter Deborah, that the beans were a gift from the bees, the result of cross pollinated plants in his Bolton, Connecticut garden somtime before 1919. He named the new variety Connecticut Wonder and believed it was a cross between Kentucky Wax and a Cranberry variety he had in his garden. In the mid 1970's Deborah gave the seeds to John Withee of Wanigan Associates fame. John Withee donated his entire collection to Seed Savers Exchange in 1981.

Cresnjevec - Pole Dry. Purchased from Deflora in Germany in 2014 and what a great purchase it was. Very productive of good quality seeds everytime it's been grown.


Connecticut Wonder - Pole Snap......................Cresnjevec - Pole Dry

 

[Branching Out]

Finally one of the Grandma Rivera's Lima bean pods has a respectable 'baby bump'. After many months of waiting I have lowered my expectations and am very grateful to see the potential for harvesting a dry seed-- even if it's only one. For now the plants are nestled under cover of the overhang of the roof and we still have no frost in the long-term focus. I have advised my husband that we may need to cut the plants off at some point, and then hang them upside down inside the house to finish drying. That sure caught his attention.

 

[ruralmamma]

With the exception of one tray of drying pods, I sorted and labeled all my bean seed from this season yesterday. From one Appalachian grex I picked out three varieties I want to grow separately and from another mix I picked out ten varieties to experiment with. At the most I saved 20 seeds but some only have 2-4 seeds so I'll definitely be coddling them.

Have one variety for @Blue-Jay and am returning half the yield from one of the mixes to the original supplier. Looking forward to some downtime yet eager for next season.

 

[Decoy1]

There seem to be two slight variants of Ruth Bible in circulation. I received seeds from two different sources this year, one American and one British. The British seeds are rounder in shape

The American ones a little longer and similar to the ones pictured by Russ on his website (https://www.abeancollectorswindow.com/networkpage8.html) and also by @heirloomgal at #642. I wonder whether anyone else has come across this disparity.

I think the difference in colour is accounted for by the fact that the lower seeds dated from 2020.


My US sourced seeds failed to survive so I can't compare growing habits and the European ones struggled too, but managed to produce the good quality seeds above for trying again next year.

 

[flowerbug]

finished a bag last night so can now move on to the next bag. still finding some interesting variations. way too busy this week and i really need to get outside to get some of these bags of bean pods dug into some gardens a little bit. i also have some wood ashes i can put down at the same time in a few gardens so that is a useful thing to be able to do that only once instead of twice. all i need is a few hours here or there with the wind not blowing too hard, which can be a challenge this time of the year...

 

[heirloomgal]

I put the lids on all the seed jars and put them out in the cold dry room this evening. Now, I wait on a pin until tomorrow, when I check them to make sure all is okay. Thanks for the courage boost @Blue-Jay!

 

[flowerbug]

the beans i have here inside are completely dried out by now with the furnace running every morning and the pods being kept in paper bags there's no wet pods at all. i wouldn't have any fear at all of there being any needing much more drying down and could all go in containers but i'm still shelling stage and not to the sorting stage. the sorting stage is where i get rid of any of the beans that look like they may have some bit of mold on them that i didn't catch the during shelling and remove the stickers and hand painted barcodes that i put on each bean (just kidding )...

 

[Triffid]

Oh no! A disasterous season? Was the weather uncooperative?

Yes, very, and slugs abound. So much got demolished by them overnight and any replacements were a struggle to keep alive. Overall a major failure. I've never seen so many slugs in my life... dozens per sq metre.

 

[Triffid]

the sorting stage is where i get rid of any of the beans that look like they may have some bit of mold on them that i didn't catch the during shelling and remove the stickers and hand painted barcodes that i put on each bean (just kidding )...

You joke but I'd bet a few of us here would go to these lengths if they were necessary...