2023 Little Easy Bean Network - Beans Beyond The Colors Of A Rainbow

heirloomgal

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Pole beans today getting the best watering they've had yet.
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Michael Lusk

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Lost a handful of pole beans to rabbits, but not my network beans thankfully. I'm in the middle of Indianapolis, but we have tons of rabbits largely because they don't have any predators (and my dog is no help). They don't seem to go for the raised beds, but today's project was to try and deter them in one of my small beds where I just planted a bunch of beans...it's only 14" but hopefully it'll keep out the lazier ones at least.
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Ridgerunner

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Do you have anymore Highlight seed. I planted some in flowerpots in the backyard only one came up and it doesn't look healthiy. Not sure if it will make any new seed. All I have is seed from 2016 and I would have to go through the whole process of stabalizing it. I thought maybe you have some good seed left.
No. not of that one. It is one that has repeated each time so I think it is stabilized but it has never been productive. It just kind of limps along and never produces well. I sent you everything I had of Highlight.
 

heirloomgal

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Lost a handful of pole beans to rabbits, but not my network beans thankfully. I'm in the middle of Indianapolis, but we have tons of rabbits largely because they don't have any predators (and my dog is no help). They don't seem to go for the raised beds, but today's project was to try and deter them in one of my small beds where I just planted a bunch of beans...it's only 14" but hopefully it'll keep out the lazier ones at least.View attachment 57996
Maybe you could lay a few sticks across the top to help discourage the bunny's courage? I don't have rabbits as bean predators here, but I assume they're cautious by nature and averse to things they're not sure of?
 

flowerbug

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Our pet rabbit loves beans more than life itself. They are her greatest joy in life. I will have to keep a very close eye on my network beans to make sure she doesn't log them, and I am considering planter a special bean patch just for her to decimate. ;)

i have 10 lbs of very poor quality dry navy pea beans that i'm using as worm food. they could be used to sprout and then feed the sprouts to the bunny - if i had a bunny... :)

one way to discourage bunnies from raiding gardens is to have a fence which blocks the view in addition to keeping them out. they're not as tempted to go places they can't see. some kind of visual barrier added will help.
 

flowerbug

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it looks like the weather will cooperate enough this morning to get out and poke some beans along the edge of a pathway which rarely gets used. i've wanted to plant it with beans for the past several years since we removed the pea gravel but i kept getting distracted.

more Purple Dove beans will work perfectly so i'm doing that today and then watering a little to make sure all the seeds are moist enough to keep sprouting.

[later edits]

got those planted and all the gardens watered a bit. a lot of beans have sprouted! it is good to see all those beanie babies. :)

right now we're in the middle of a swirly so i'm not sure we'll get any rains from this or not.

looks like i got nearly 100% germination from the odd batches of PD out crosses.
 
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heirloomgal

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After a few days of dark skies and rain, the sun finally returned this evening. It is remarkable how a soaking like that greens up all those bean leaves and makes them seem so much more lush. Several beans put out runners and started climbing in that short, rainy time. It's like everything got boosted. Including the weed seeds!
 

Michael Lusk

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Total gardening geek post, found my first bean blossom of the season this morning. It's our go-to family bean that we've grown for years, it's a French climbing bean called Algarve which I purchased from Park Seed probably 15 years ago. It's definitely the little things that make me happy in the mornings, and coffee.
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