The 2014 Little Easy Bean Network - Get New Beans On The Cheap

Nice rows of beans and tomatoes. I'm a little jealous right now but I am more jealous of the sunshine!

marshallsmyth said:

Hal's heading toward the winter solstice down there. We're heading toward the summer solstice up here.

Russ, those Early Girl descendents are looking great.

I'm going to have dry beans earlier this year than ever. Already some of them are in what would be the snap bean stage. So far your variety MONEY looks to be winning the race to first dry pods. The stage they are at now, smallish snap size, they look like they'd be tasty if properly stringed.

August 5th has several years been the earliest dry bean day, and is the day I usually aim for for first dry bean. Looks like I might beat that by 3 weeks this year.

The very few plants that have so far died, a Nickell, and a Yellow Bird, appear to have had their root hairs nibbled on underground by something very small, with the root stems seeming to have tried to make up for it by growing many root stems. So my verdict so far is either Millipede or Potato Bug, whichever one is slowest moving underground. Those will simply have to be cleared out next winter when I sieve the soil, all of it.

I have 3 good Ganymede Lima plants, and FINALLY, one of the GRANDMA RIVERA'S PUERTO RICO Lima seeds has sprouted. I'm training the other Limas near it away from it to give it room and light. That one is special to me, and is a true and direct to me family heirloom, one that seems to be very unique.

I'll try to catch up on the field notes soon. Had a busy week here with things going on. Pole beans and Lima beans are beginning to bloom.

Oh, Russ, Sandpiper Outcross is the second fastest and third tallest pole bean so far.

Prairie Patch seems to be tallest and most vigorous. Lambada is right up there in the front pack!

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Marshall try telling the weather I'm heading towards winter solstice, it doesn't seem to think so! I should be enjoying frosts killing or forcing all the pests and such into submission by now but I still have aphids on the roses. I'm actually thinking I can get away trying some beans in the greenhouse in black plastic pots.

Hi Marshall,

I would imagine with the drought going on you are getting mostly sunshine, and with wartering your bean plants the constant sun is causing things to mature very fast this year.

Also thanks for the compliments on the Early Girl decendant tomatoes. There is a potato leafed plant and a regular leafed one. I think last year all the regular leafed ones grew as determinate plants. I'm looking to find an indeterminate one with smooth rounded fruits like the Early Girl. One of my neighbors tried eating some of my tomatoes and said they were very sweet types. I think it takes close to 10 years to dehybridize a tomato. It will be interesting to see if I have any success in this attempt.

I'm wondering if that Sandpiper will produce seeds the same again or if you will get maybe several different seedcoats from it. I'm thinking the Prairie Patch might settle down and be stable soon. You might get the same seed as what you planted.

Hal I think you should at least try a couple of beans in pots. In the coldest part of your winter would it get cold enough to freeze bean plants in the greenhouse?

I've got three bean plants growing in my house right now that I've planted in April. I guess that's when my gardening gets off to a slow start when I plant these potted beans and start tomatoes under my grow lights. Two of the plants (Buckskin Girl) have started blooming and one plant (Owl's Head) has a number of small pods on it. The plants are in a west facing window in my living room and get direct sun from about 2 in the afternoon to about 7:15 (14:00-19:15 ) I should have my first dry pod from Owl's Head close to the end of July. These potted beans don't set as many pods but when I'm curious about a certain seed coat. I grow one in a pot in the house so I can get an early look at how the seed might turn out on the rest of them growing outside.

This Is The Owl's Head Plant. It has 10 little pods on it. I don't know if it will mature the seed in all 10 pods or if some will dry up and abort due to the amount of soil in the pot and 5 hours a day of sunlight. The last 2 years I have gotten about 6 pods with full size seed in them of the variety I had grown at the time. Perfect disease free pods. Not a blemish on them and beautiful seed.

This Owl's head will climb although I've grown it on the ground as a bush. I should plant it around a pole sometime and see how high it will climb. Might get a lot more good seed out if it that way.

I think it would be fun to have a greenhouse. I could see myself with hundreds of good sized pots with beans growing in them. The plants would have the benefit of not having Japanese beetles munching on them all the time growing in a greenhouse.

Oh boy! I got 2 packages in the mail today!!!

One from Hal with 38 beautiful varieties of beans in it. Thank you so much!!!

Another one came from The Intrepid Seed Explorer Joseph Simcox, with 9 beautiful varieties in it. Thank you so much Joseph if you are here in disguise.

I won't be able to plant these this year, but they will definitely be going in next season's garden.

Hal, there are several with the word College in the name. Is there a story behind those?

Hey Marsh,

Glad your beans got through from Hal. U.S. customs and Border Protection took all the packets he sent to me. I just got an empty envelope with a no-no form inside and a photo of their bird. They decorated the outside of the envelope with green U.S. Customs and Border Protection tape. Anyway so happy for you that you are having a great fun beany day.

How incredibly disappointing, Bluejay. JackB on here has also had a lot of hassel from US Customs. (ETA: I knew Marshall would be willing to share with you. )

I've had about 50% germination on the Star 2056's at this point, which is 4 plants total. A little on the puny side, but I think they'll get going soon. I have two more seeds left and I'll papertowel/baggie sprout them. All 3 Molley's Zebra are doing great. I have them caged and guarded. I don't usually use any sprays until after seeing bug damage, but I've been keeping a little sprinkle of garden dust on them preemptively.

marshallsmyth said:

Ohhh, luck of the draw on that I guess Russ. But, after I grow them out next year I'll be able to send some of each to you.

The package I got had an Aero safety hazard stamping and signature on it.

I really don't think anyone can make truly dangerous bombs out of beans! Course, biologically digested in large quantities...

On another note, tomorrow I have to walk along the water lines all around to see if we have a small leak somewhere. Our water tanks do have decent inflow right now, but they are staying an inch from full.

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I'm glad one made it! I split the important stuff 50/50 between you both as a security measure.

marshallsmyth said:

Ohhh, luck of the draw on that I guess Russ. But, after I grow them out next year I'll be able to send some of each to you.

The package I got had an Aero safety hazard stamping and signature on it.

I really don't think anyone can make truly dangerous bombs out of beans! Course, biologically digested in large quantities...

When I sent beans to down under I had a form to fill out. Where it asked what the contents are, I listed them as Ornamental Beans. Which is absolutely true.

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Last Year when I sent Hal beans I put "Flower Seeds" on the customs form on his package and they got through, as he has ordered flower seeds from places in Europe and it seems they go through without any problems in Oz. Actually sent two packages to him. I've sent beans to people in Europe last year and put "Beads" on the customs form. People in Europe have been sending me beans without any problems and they even put beans on the form. This is the first time I have ever had a bean package confiscated. I think it would have been nice if they had just sent the package back to Hal. I sent a package to Germany last year, and their customs officers opened the box. Then reclosed the box and sent the package with it's beans inside back to me. I thought that was really very decent of them. Eventually I found a gardener in Germany on Facebook who's local customs people don't open overseas packages. That person was willing to forward the package for me. Like I told Hal. Had it been a different day and the package went through the hands of another customs officer. The package would have probably gone through. No it's not the end of the world. It's just sad to see the seeds wasted away after someone puts in all the effort to growing them.

Just curious. Did the Botanical Explorer send you a sample of the green seeded "Fort Portal Jade"? Never in all my years have I seen a green seeded bean. Can you imagine what kind of cross possibilities that one might make. I can't wait until I get my seed numbers up on this one so I can plant it next to just about everything.