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

[heirloomgal]

I have wondered about this for the last couple seasons. Can a single bean vine produce different colored flowers? Can there be more than one color of flower in one plant? It seemed possible from what I observed in the last 2 years, but it was hard to be certain because vines get tangled and then there is the possibility of crosses. And often the one flower that looked a different color was more mature than the other and often fading away, so I wondered if it only appeared that the flowers were different. I've seen that with certain peas, how the flowers seem to change color at different stages of maturity. Well! I have my answer and it is yes. I just got lucky and found some vines today where they were at just the right stage to bee able to clearly identify it.

These photos are of several different varieties including Grandmere & Old Time Golden Stick.

 

[flowerbug]

i think it is most likely the age difference as i've seen plenty of that. i don't recall ever seeing a different colored flower on the same plant but again, i'm sure i've not looked closely at each and every flower and i'm quite ok with it being possible as perhaps a chance cellular mutation of a growing tip could do something like that, but it would be extremely rare.

 

[heirloomgal]

I found this today - it's like the Sangre de Toro beans just 'fell off' the pole after seemingly climbing just fine for a good height. What the heck? I looked more closely at the situation and realized that instead of meaningfully wrapping around the pole they were actually wrapping around each other while growing upwards against the pole. They weren't on the pole at all. The mass eventually got too big to hold itself up and 'fell off'. I guess I'll have to untangle some of that tomorrow and see if I can coax them to grab the pole.

'Tis the season to do untangling.

Ugra Saja soybeans. It's surprising how early they're forming pods.

I got tired of playing 'hide the last 2 unfenced soybean plants every night' game and decided to take my chances. Have not seen bean damage for a while now. Guess who won that game.

Paas Lintorfer bush bean is putting on quite a clump of flowers.

Network bean Turkey #1. Hefty vines! Pole is 8 feet. No beans yet though.

Network bean Gabarone Sugar. It's a different bean in that it doesn't seem like a bush, but yet it isn't really climbing yet either. It's flowering though. Pink blossoms.

 

[Zeedman]

my experimental planting of small patches of adzuki beans got mostly munched on by a groundhog. if that is all that i lose to that critter i'll be surprised but it was urged to vacate with a few air gun rounds. not sure if it will be back or not. or another will come along...

however, there's also a chance that that planting decoyed the critter into eating them instead of the other nearby beans.

The problem I have with adzuki & mung beans is that the only thing mice seem to like better are soybeans... probably due to the low, thin-hulled pods. The adzuki this year ("Murasaki") is planted in my 'safe' pots, up on a deck. That one is particularly vulnerable, since its longer DTM puts it right in the middle of the annual vole outbreak.

Adzuki seem to really like pot culture, I get my best quality seed when grown that way.

 

[Blue-Jay]

The bush snap beans I planted a week ago are all up. Does that qualify as a straight row?

 

[heirloomgal]

The bush snap beans I planted a week ago are all up. Does that qualify as a straight row?

View attachment 58882 View attachment 58883

Oooohh! I just LOVE a super straight row! Sometimes I think, deep, deep down, I have an inner machinist.

 

[Blue-Jay]

I found a vegetable farm and market here in the county where I live that grows green beans. I'm finding the frozen green beans in grocery stores anymore are often seedy and sometimes stringy. I want to pick and prepare for the freezer nearly a years worth of green beans. They emailed me today and they are waiting on a new batch of plants to start producing pickable size pods. I'll check with them in a couple of days.

 

[Branching Out]

We are hoping to master the art of fermenting green beans this year, which from what I have read (I took out every available book on fermenting from the library-- twice!) seems like a rather nuanced endeavour.

 

[flowerbug]

We are hoping to master the art of fermenting green beans this year, which from what I have read (I took out every available book on fermenting from the library-- twice!) seems like a rather nuanced endeavour.

that's a new one on me. good luck! we've pickled them before and also made the bean salads (which are also somewhat pickled). i'd be kinda leery as i'm not sure how acidic green beans get just by themselves. i'd feel a lot better if they were shredded and mixed in with cabbage to ferment (and not a major component). if you have time details will be interesting. i'm pretty sure i won't ever do it though.

 

[flowerbug]

picked another pile of Purple Dove beans which will probably be the last of them from the first patch i'd planted on May 4th. they're still flowering but not many flowers.

also i went through the odd out-cross patch to see how things were looking. most of the plants look to be semi-runner or something other than strictly bush habit. the green stemmed plants all had white flowers. no pods i could see yet.

i have hundreds of plants now putting on flowers.

the Japanese Beetles are not as bad as some years, but i think it is early yet. what i could see i pulled off (and kilt them ded).

on the whole things look pretty good.

it's just starting to rain here so that too is also good. heavy squall line coming right at us so we may get some hail and heavy local rains from it.