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

The offsite where I have my deer fence where I grew pole beans and zinnias last year. The fellow that owns the property has been calling my bean growing project "Bean Acres". I messaged him a couple days ago that I would come out Saturday and mow the grass inside "Bean Acres". Unknown to me his wife made up a sign last fall to put over the top of the west entry gate. So when I came out with my trailer and lawn mower and got out of my van to open the gate to the fence. I noticed something up on top of the gate. I thought it was very nice of them that they made up this sign. It really made me feel like one of their family. First photo is a refresher photo what my Bean Acres fenced in area looks like. Second photo is the "Bean Acres" sign they made up.

Zeedman said:

(added emphasis mine) You probably can grow some cowpeas. There are two short DTM, true-bush varieties that were bred to be grown in Minnesota; MN 150 (which I grew last year) and MN 13 (which I am growing this year). If you are able to grow beans for seed & have at least 60 warm days, chances are that either of them would produce dry seed in your climate. If you can grow limas to seed, even more varieties might be possible. Unlike all Phaseolus beans, cowpeas go from pod to dry very quickly. Despite their reputation for being a warm-climate crop, cowpeas are consistently my first dry bean seed.

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heirloomgal said:

I tried growing 'Jackson Wonder' lima beans last year, and had no luck. I don't know if that is because it was so unusually hot, or that we had such an unusually short summer. My days for growing are about 125; cowpeas are not a seed type found here, but there are plenty in the grocery stores. I wonder if I plant some of those if I could get them to grow. I've always wondered about that since I love black eyed peas so much.

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Even if you can’t get them to dry seed around here we primarily eat them as fresh shelling beans and the immature pods can be used as snap beans lots of people do that in areas where it’s too hot for green beans. I’m not fond of Lima’s they seem to finicky for me. They don’t like it cold but if it gets over 85 the flowers start dropping.

Bluejay77 said:

The offsite where I have my deer fence where I grew pole beans and zinnias last year. The fellow that owns the property has been calling my bean growing project "Bean Acres". I messaged him a couple days ago that I would come out Saturday and mow the grass inside "Bean Acres" I unknown to me his wife made up a sign last fall to put over the top of the west entry gate. So when I came out with my trailer and lawn mower and got out of my van to open the gate to the fence. I noticed something up on top of the gate. I thought it was very nice of them that they made up this sign. It really made me feel like one of their family. First photo is a refresher photo what my Bean Acres fenced in area looks like. Second photo is the "Bean Acres" sign they made up.

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That is so great @Bluejay77 !

Artichoke Lover said:

Even if you can’t get them to dry seed around here we primarily eat them as fresh shelling beans and the immature pods can be used as snap beans lots of people do that in areas where it’s too hot for green beans. I’m not fond of Lima’s they seem to finicky for me. They don’t like it cold but if it gets over 85 the flowers start dropping.

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Maybe that's what happened, it was too hot. They had a really poor bean set, even immature there was hardly nothing at all there. I like the black eyed peas so much better anyway

That sign is awesome. What a lovely thing to do for you!

@Zeedman
look at your envelope at the top. It’s me.

HmooseK said:

@Zeedman
look at your envelope at the top. It’s me.

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So you are above me? How much do you weigh???

Something I've been wondering about since last year. Last summer I planted a row of bush beans that I had gotten as a substitute packet for something else I had ordered. It wasn't a bean I was familiar with but I thought I'd give it a try. Turned out that it wasn't a bush, but more of a semi runner. I had some of those tomato cages around (the ones that are not actually big enough for tom's) and plunked a row of the cages down the bean row. They climbed on and did very well with that; they actually started reaching above the tomato cage. When the runners got to about a foot above I just started cutting them off with scissors. I went out with the scissors about three times that summer to cut the runners back. I'd never 'pruned' a bean plant in full growth before, but it seemed like I had to do it. There was no where else for the plants to go.

I couldn't help but notice when fall arrived that the pod production was really tremendous. I collected a huge volume of seed, considering that the row was only about 6-7 ft long. Relative to the amount of seed planted/seed harvested, it must have been the biggest producer (not including tall poles) if not in the top three last year. Plus, I ate many beans from those plants as well. It got me thinking, I wonder if pruning bean plants could actually make them more productive?

I know that it's a dicey proposition given that many of us are struggling to get the plants to maturity to harvest seed. Cutting them back might slow them up somewhat. But I wonder if, with beans that have more of a sure thing DTM, if pruning could actually significantly increase seed harvests. Any opinions? Has anyone ever pruned, even accidentally, a bean plant and noticed a difference?

i received these in a trade and they were marked Calypso. I know that bean goes by several names such as Ying Yang, Orca, Calypso and maybe a few I don’t know about. A lady on another forum says they don’t look like what she grows as calypso.
So I ask here. What say you?

HmooseK said:

i received these in a trade and they were marked Calypso. I know that bean goes by several names such as Ying Yang, Orca, Calypso and maybe a few I don’t know about. A lady on another forum says they don’t look like what she grows as calypso.
So I ask here. What say you?

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nope, looks to me they've crossed or mutated away from Calypso(etc). i've seen various versions of the name too and supposedly different days to maturity but i could never see any difference in them when i had them side by side in the same conditions.