2025 Little Easy Bean Network - Growers Of The Future Will Be Glad We Saved

[heirloomgal]

Tried to get out there and take some photos today. Was a bit late in the day, but was able to snap a few.

Network bean, a bush type (tag spells the name, I could never remember to spell that!) , is at this point -

There has been so much to do that I haven't been looking real close at the bean plants recently, so I was shocked when I lifted the plants and saw this today! It's Graziskai #1, a Polish bush bean. Wow, this is early for me & my season.
Love it!

One of the 2025 miracles. A single seed sprouted after a very long time, and it looked really terrible as a sprout. Seemed like it was missing parts as a small seedling. And it grew way slow too. I put it in a pot not sure if it was really worth the bother but boy am I ever glad I did because despite being VERY slow to get going (seed was from 2019) the plant has turned out really lovely. I'm quite thrilled with it.

These 2 also are surprisingly (wonderfully) early, Robert Hazelwood and Big Mama pole bean.

 

[Artorius]

@heirloomgal
Graziskiai #1 is a bean from Lithuania. I got it from a Polish seed bank.

 

[Blue-Jay]

I got a surprise in my bean garden today. A bean that I got this past winter from a grower in Nanoose Bay, BC. It must be a bush that I thought might be a pole bean. So I started it early along with the pole beans and it produced some pods and blossomed long before any of the pole beans started blooming. I still am shocked that it produced dry seed this early.

Margot - Bush Dry

 

[heirloomgal]

@heirloomgal
Graziskiai #1 is a bean from Lithuania. I got it from a Polish seed bank.

Thank you @Artorius for letting me know! I don't know why I assumed it was Polish?!

 

[heirloomgal]

I got a surprise in my bean garden today. A bean that I got this past winter from a grower in Nanoose Bay, BC. It must be a bush that I thought might be a pole bean. So I started it early along with the pole beans and it produced some pods and blossomed long before any of the pole beans started blooming. I still am shocked that it produced dry seed this early.

View attachment 76509
Margot - Bush Dry

Wow! Gorgeous seeds @Blue-Jay, that is a seriously early bean!

 

[heirloomgal]

Some more bean pics!

The runner beans are just loaded with flowers! And there are itty bitty beans starting! I think they're up to about 8-10 feet. I hope for a better crop this year, as last year's was pathetic.

I've been scratching my head wondering why this bean might be called 'Black Snake'. It came to me today!

The sweet little wax bean 'Elektra'! The plants are so tidy and neat, I really like it's form. It seems fairly early and the beans are just starting to form with many more flowers waiting to transform into beans. The pods start a mint green.

Network bean Barry Island continues to be farthest ahead in height, of every single other variety I've planted, including the runner bean! I mean just wow level of vigor for all the plants. The sapling is about 10 feet tall, and the vine has come back down (you can see the tip pointing to the left) by several feet. Super tall! I saw some little beans forming on there today too.

Update on network bean Slavonski Zeleni (right) - the leaves are looking pretty good I think? I wonder now if I should have pulled out the ones in the front yard; they may have just been stressed out by the early high heat or something.

Pretty flower on pole bean 'Mathilda', or maybe 'Mathilde'.

Dakota Bumble looking good despite some crowding.

My little front yard pot collection of beans. Well, it looks like putting Juanita Smith in one of these was not a good idea. While it started out as the tiniest, wispiest looking little pole bean plant - almost mini leaves - it is turning out to be a regular leaved full size pole bean! So, I keep snipping the tips to drive the growth into width instead of height. It's wonderfully healthy (it's the last on the left but it got cut off in the photo) so worst case scenario I replant next year in the ground and collect from it what I can. There have been more than a few surprises with bean growth types this year, but that is part of the fun I suppose. (Sort of, lol.)

One of the pole bean gardens. Will post photo of the other one once I get it weeded. Everything is doing really good in here though a few are being stubborn to climb the trees.

A rare Canadian bean that I'd never even heard of until I connected with a member of SSE, and he sent it to me. Isn't that how it goes, a gardener in the US has a Canadian bean that not a single other Canadian seed company or seed exchange member has. 'Saskatchewan Dry'. A lesson in how the more people all over the world who save seeds, the greater the chance that a seed variety will not be lost.