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

[flowerbug]

What's chewing them??

Japanese Beetles, deer, groundhogs. i've been able to hunt all the rabbits for the moment. groundhogs are being sneaky and getting through the fenced garden barrier (it's the wrong kind of fence to keep them out entirely) all the plants are big enough now that they will survive. deer are sometimes munching on a few of the beans plants in the garden outside the fence - always a risk in those gardens but at least they've not eaten them all back to nothing.

 

[Blue-Jay]

Fasold is one of those beans where you scratch your head and ask yourself 'why isn't this bean more famous?' I'm not surprised that the people you've shared that bean with have loved it! It really stands out. Yes, feel free to copy my text I don't mind at all. That bean deserves to be much better known. Any idea where it comes from?

I got the bean from a Seed Saver Exchange member in Iowa. I had a neighbor that knew I grew beans and saved seed and this neighbor had asked me for a bean that was slender and fairly straight. So I gleaned through the listing of the SSE yearbook back in 2016 and came up with Fasold. That is the history of how and why I acquired the bean. I grew it for seed that year and then gave seed to the neighbor in 2017. They just love the bean like you do. I had also given seed to the dental hygenist at the dental place where I go. Again another strong we like this bean reaction from them too. The grower in Blyth, Ontario also likes this bean. I've taken seed to seed swaps and described the bean and sometimes nearly sell out what I have taken to those swaps. The SSE member I got the bean from listed Territorial seed as their source.

I have this book that I purchased from SSE called the Garden Seed Inventory and you can look up varieties of different vegetables and it gives sources for different cultivars. I found Fasold in an older edition of the catalog and the source given for Fasold was Thompson And Morgan seeds. You won't find it on their website now. I wrote to them on a contact form but when I click on submit nothing happens.

 

[flowerbug]

JB damage? I've only seen a little so far, to the point where I have not (yet) found the need to put out traps. Given that the grubs develop in lawns (and mine is mostly brown) maybe there is a bright side to this dry spell.

I've also found a pile of green droppings just outside the garden fence, that seems to indicate that something is eating a lot of beetles.

yes, JBs, but also deer and groundhogs...

skunks, possums and raccoons will all go for the grubs if they can get to them. voles and moles will also eat them if they can find them.

i can't possibly trap out all the JBs here, the roads are lined with grassy areas, the field behind us is mostly grasses, the field to the south of us is now reverting to grass... etc.

what i can do is select for plants that will survive and still produce even if there is some damage. PD's may be JB magnets but they also survive and are productive even if i don't get a chance to get all the JBs off them.

 

[flowerbug]

I got the bean from a Seed Saver Exchange member in Iowa. I had a neighbor that knew I grew beans and saved seed and this neighbor had asked me for a bean that was slender and fairly straight.

Venda is a slender and straight bean if someone is looking for a bush version instead.

 

[heirloomgal]

Found these today! Old Time Golden Stick network beans are starting to dry down. Might rain tonight so I pulled them off the vine.

The things we do for our beans! The rhubarb plants were SO big, hundreds of stalks this year, they developed their own ecosystem. Frogs, snakes, beetles, too many worms. The leaves were enormous too, just huge. DH saw a vole jump up into my bean bed from the foliage below and that was all I needed to hear. The rhubarb is getting turfed for this year! 2 wheelbarrows full of leaves and stalks. There was some fine straw from spring so I raked all that too and dumped it. Now that I got rid of it I can see it was a good move, it was too cluttered in there. This will allow better air flow for the beans too. They’ll come back next year, they always do. Usually the plants are dried up and gone by late July anyway.

My bean drying room is now back under construction! Project was started last year with the intent to be completed this summer. Panels on ceiling will hopefully be done tomorrow. Newly insulated walls and ceiling too. I think some long bars on the ceiling, like shower rods, would work well for hanging bush bean plants to dry.

Old ceiling that we double insulated with two layers of sheet plus spray insulation.

My bean window.🪟

 

[heirloomgal]

I think I discovered the reason why the photos I'm posting are appearing in a reduced quality state. It's the forum, apparently it's a storage resource measure. My tech friend came over here to check out my pictures and could see that they were indeed being altered. The forum is powered by XenForo when it comes to uploading pictures and that platform alters images. At least some of them, depending.

I don't know why this was not the case with my Samsung Tablet, those images seem to have uploaded without any interference. Must be something about the apple ecosystem I guess. The file size of these photos may be larger too.

 

[flowerbug]

...The file size of these photos may be larger too.

likely as newer devices will have more pixels per image.

when i post pictures i'm usually posting links to pictures on my website and before uploading i trim and adjust them and also generate a thumbnail image which is not as big and that i link here.

sometimes when i post to the TEG picture of the week forum i use the larger image which is available on the website (i always put a link on my website to the full size image so people can get those if they want to look in more detail or closer up magnification).

 

[Branching Out]

I was only able to get a few of my White Coco network beans to survive to the seedling stage, and then they seemed to be slow growers for the first month. They were planted out about six weeks ago, and seem to be growing well now. Alongside them is sorghum Ba-Ye-Qi which is supposed to act as a bean pole, but which has hard time keeping pace with the growth of the beans.

 

[Zeedman]

I was only able to get a few of my White Coco network beans to survive to the seedling stage, and then they seemed to be slow growers for the first month. They were planted out about six weeks ago, and seem to be growing well now. Alongside them is sorghum Ba-Ye-Qi which is supposed to act as a bean pole, but which has hard time keeping pace with the growth of the beans.

Watch out for that bunny! Did it photo-bomb... or get caught planning lunch?

 

[heirloomgal]

I was only able to get a few of my White Coco network beans to survive to the seedling stage, and then they seemed to be slow growers for the first month. They were planted out about six weeks ago, and seem to be growing well now. Alongside them is sorghum Ba-Ye-Qi which is supposed to act as a bean pole, but which has hard time keeping pace with the growth of the beans.

That bunny is too cute! Can you leave her wander around your yard without fear that she'll escape or get caught by something? That's amazing that you can have loose and she doesn't run away.