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

heirloomgal

heirloomgal

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Been getting together some bean packets for the Seedy Saturday seed swap table. Going to do a little self promo and put my info on the packet liners, but it also occured to me that I can distribute some beans that I otherwise may not grow. Quite a few of these young seed savers have asked me for crossed seed over the last couple years, so I made 'Breed Your Own Bean' packets and included some crossed bean seeds in the packet, and gave a short blurb on what crossed beans are and how to proceed. I think it'll be something different for the table. Was fun to put together.
 
BeanWonderin

BeanWonderin

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We found quite a few red-ish black beans among last year's Viola as we were shelling them out recently. The pods were identical and we didn't grow any other black beans in the same garden, so I'm thinking these could be an outcross, right?

Some of our 2023 Viola (top) with all of the black beans we found:
IMG_3452.jpeg


The bean size and shape isn't great, but I am hoping to grow a row of them to see what they produce.
 
Blue-Jay

Blue-Jay

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BeanWonderin said:
We found quite a few red-ish black beans among last year's Viola as we were shelling them out recently. The pods were identical and we didn't grow any other black beans in the same garden, so I'm thinking these could be an outcross, right?
Click to expand...
Yes you have an outcross. It will be interesting to see what you get when you grow out some of those black beans.
 
flowerbug

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BeanWonderin said:
We found quite a few red-ish black beans among last year's Viola as we were shelling them out recently. The pods were identical and we didn't grow any other black beans in the same garden, so I'm thinking these could be an outcross, right?

Some of our 2023 Viola (top) with all of the black beans we found:
View attachment 64122

The bean size and shape isn't great, but I am hoping to grow a row of them to see what they produce.
Click to expand...

:) hahaha! always fun if you have the space for it. :) :) :)

how many years have you been growing Viola?
 
BeanWonderin

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flowerbug said:
:) hahaha! always fun if you have the space for it. :) :) :)

how many years have you been growing Viola?
Click to expand...
We have grown Viola for a few years now. Got our first seed from @Blue-Jay (thank you!). Each year we grow a little more since it has been such a good bean for us. We haven't finished shelling out our 2023 beans but I'm guessing we'll end up with around 40 lbs.
 
Blue-Jay

Blue-Jay

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BeanWonderin said:
We have grown Viola for a few years now. Got our first seed from @Blue-Jay (thank you!). Each year we grow a little more since it has been such a good bean for us. We haven't finished shelling out our 2023 beans but I'm guessing we'll end up with around 40 lbs.
Click to expand...
Wow ! how large of an area do you plant to get 40 lbs. of Viola. That is so wonderful.
 
BeanWonderin

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Blue-Jay said:
Wow ! how large of an area do you plant to get 40 lbs. of Viola. That is so wonderful.
Click to expand...
I'm not sure what the exact dimensions are. In the picture below, the darker plants in the foreground are Viola and the lighter plants in the background are Tongues of Fire. We shelled 43 lbs of dried beans from Tongues of Fire. The photo is cropped from a panorama, so the perspective is a bit off.
IMG_1451.jpeg


Here is a view from another angle, taken during harvest a month later.
IMG_2568.jpeg
 
Blue-Jay

Blue-Jay

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BeanWonderin said:
I'm not sure what the exact dimensions are. In the picture below, the darker plants in the foreground are Viola and the lighter plants in the background are Tongues of Fire. We shelled 43 lbs of dried beans from Tongues of Fire. The photo is cropped from a panorama, so the perspective is a bit off.
Click to expand...
If you can get your grow out of Viola large enough the next step might be to bring in a combine. Do you eat that many dry beans in a years time? I could imagine a family could easily consume that many beans in a year. How would you like to sell me a pound and a half of viola for about $45.00 plus the cost of postage. I could then put Viola back up for sale on my website again. Would you weed out most of the very small, and mishappened beans for me? 24 ounces of fairly uniform beans. This is what I do to all my seed in the fall. Sort out the small and mishapen.
 
BeanWonderin

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Blue-Jay said:
If you can get your grow out of Viola large enough the next step might be to bring in a combine. Do you eat that many dry beans in a years time? I could imagine a family could easily consume that many beans in a year. How would you like to sell me a pound and a half of viola for about $45.00 plus the cost of postage. I could then put Viola back up for sale on my website again. Would you weed out most of the very small, and mishappened beans for me? 24 ounces of fairly uniform beans. This is what I do to all my seed in the fall. Sort out the small and mishapen.
Click to expand...
I would love to send you some Viola, sure! I'll PM you and work out the details. I think we could do a trade.

We do eat a lot of beans each year. Dry beans are just great, because we have the flexibility of processing them throughout the winter rather than all the fresh vegetables in the fall. My friend has an All-crop 66 harvester but we've never tried it with beans. That would speed up the shelling, but we like shelling by hand, too. I think getting out dried down for combining might be tricky.
 
Blue-Jay

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Here is an Australian bean website for your viewing pleasure. The sad part is the beans on this site are not readily available from this site anyway.

seedfreaks.com.au

Bob Reid's Beans - Seedfreaks | Sow the change you want to seed

Bob Reid’s Beans Bob Reid’s private bean collection ⚠️ These are for your viewing pleasure and are not for sale. Notes on the origin of the beans, and further information will be available at some stage, when Bob’s found the notes buried in a container and we’ve had time to get them online...
seedfreaks.com.au seedfreaks.com.au
 
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