2025 Little Easy Bean Network - Growers Of The Future Will Be Glad We Saved

[heirloomgal]

The last of the pictures I took on Friday, which was the last day I saw sunshine.

Brutte e Buon
This was a really lovely pole bean, the seed are larger than it appears in the photo. Quite purple too. And it was easy to dry them up on the vine. The name is so cute too, 'Ugly But Good' which is apparently an Italian saying that usually refers to rustic or traditional dishes. I wish now I had tried the beans at the green stage to see if they can be eaten then!

Zazza
Reminds me so much of Peinsipps Zweifarbige! Nice big seeds and excellent yield. Love the name!

Barba di Frate
I think this name means 'Monk's Beard'. Still trying to figure out how that fits? My favorite thing about this bean, aside from the pretty colors and early maturity, is the odd sword shape to the leaves. The most pointed bean leaves I've ever seen on a pole bean plant, almost like a houseplant.

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My harvest of 'White Beauty' has been utterly pathetic 2 years in a row now. The company told me it was a pole, though it hasn't grown that way. It's been a bush twice, so at least I've figured the growth type out now. For some reason it seems to yield so little even though the plants are nice. I'm not sure which way to proceed with it, and if I should give up. I would think there are other beans out there that look similar to this and produce better. The one perk is that the seeds all seem to form well with no culls. ​

*not sure why that font is so messed up, I couldn't change it in that last blurb

 

[flowerbug]

wow! @heirloomgal so nice to see!

 

[Artorius]

@heirloomgal I think there are several varieties with the 'Atlas' name.
This one is commercial Polish wax bean, I don't think it has any connection to Burpee, perhaps @Artorius can comment on its commercial history.

This Atlas is a Polish commercial variety introduced by the Polan company from Krakow. The seeds are no longer available for sale because most Polish pole beans have been displaced by bush varieties. The only Polish pole bean currently available in stores is Gazela.

The Atlas seeds I have were saved by the mother of a friend from a Polish gardening forum and he shared them with me. I multiplied them and sent to other gardeners, also outside Poland. I hope that Atlas will not disappear like many other Polish beans.

Other old Polan company varieties I have are Tytan and Goliat. Both, like Atlas, are pole waxes with Romano type pods.
I found some old Polish beans on the IPK Gatersleben website. I have to get them from there somehow.

 

[Blue-Jay]

My harvest of 'White Beauty' has been utterly pathetic 2 years in a row now. The company told me it was a pole, though it hasn't grown that way. It's been a bush twice, so at least I've figured the growth type out now. For some reason it seems to yield so little even though the plants are nice. I'm not sure which way to proceed with it, and if I should give up. I would think there are other beans out there that look similar to this and produce better. The one perk is that the seeds all seem to form well with no culls.

This looks like a yellow eye variety. It seems every yellow eye I have grown are not as productive although I like them because of their history. I can imagine New Englanders and Nova Scotians harvesting significant quantities of yellow eyes simply because of the large tracts of ground devoted to their growing. Perhaps this may have been all they had for another food type in their diet.

 

[flowerbug]

This looks like a yellow eye variety. It seems every yellow eye I have grown are not as productive although I like them because of their history. I can imagine New Englanders and Nova Scotians harvesting significant quantities of yellow eyes simply because of the large tracts of ground devoted to their growing. Perhaps this may have been all they had for another food type in their diet.

i've usually had reasonable results from growing them but like many other larger beans they don't really like it here when it gets hot out here and if i don't keep enough water on them or they get too much rain all at once the pods will not fill well developed beans.

i normally grow a few larger patches of them because we do like them so much, but this year my bulk bean planting of YE did not get done so i only have the ones that were scattered around in various gardens in smaller amounts and those got overgrown by weeds so didn't have much of a chance.

 

[heirloomgal]

It's a miracle - we had some sunshine today! It wasn't for long, but I ran out there for 30 minutes this afternoon to catch up with photos for the year's beans. It's amazing how quickly the quality of light fades at this time of year. The illumination is warm and orange-ish the later in the day it gets, awful really. I think for the next couple weeks every time the sun peeks out I'll have my work cut out for me.

I'm hoping to get everybody's opinion on full sun shots vs the photos taken in the shade for some of the beans. I've always felt the full sun shots are overwhelming better, but recently I've had some feedback that has got me questioning that I might be in the minority in that opinion. It may be a question of what suits each bean best.

Kabarika
I got this bean in 2016 (or thereabouts) from Annapolis Seeds, and it's been some time since they've offered it. It's been awhile since I grew it. I planted it very stupidly this year, a 2 ft wide pot planted thickly. I probably harvested less than I planted. I have no idea what I was thinking. Regardless, next year they get their own proper row in a bed. This is one I don't want to lose and I'm teetering on the edge of it!

Mandy's Orca
I got my original seeds from my friend Mandy, whose shop is now closed. My feeling with a bean that looks like this is it probably needs low nutrient soil to produce markings. It reminded me of the 'Vaquero' that I got from you @Blue-Jay. So I made a point to grow them in a pot with soil that I knew would run out of nutrition fairly quickly. It seemed to work since the seeds I harvested looked just like what I planted.

Jogl
A wax pole bean. I'm very partial to the natural variation in the shades of lavender/pink/pinkish cream in the seeds. Sadly, this variety did not yield a lot for me. Not sure if that's varietal or the season. Interestingly, while I didn't pay close attention to compare pods this bean is a dead ringer for 'Dule', one of my network bean returns for this year. They both have yellow pods, and the exact same size & color of seeds which is saying something because it's an uncommon colouration. They also yielded nearly the same amount of seed for 4 plants.

Goose
Because there is so many beans out there with 'Goose' in the name I'm calling this one 'Resilient Goose' because that is where the seeds came from, Resilient Seeds. I received this bean from a generous member of the forum @Jack Halloway 2 years ago. Not sure if you can tell from the photos but it's a very large bean seed. It did quite well for me this year.

Tirana's Violette
A marvelous pole bean. I was so happy with how well this bean did for me, and it matured in great time with nicely formed seeds. Another lovely pink shade. According to Bohnen Atlas, the origin of this bean is Albania.

Blue Shaxamaxon
One of my first network beans back in, I think, 2021! I regrew it this year because my jar was getting empty from people requesting this bean. I am kicking myself now that I didn't open a pod when they were halfway dry, to see the shelly bean color. I forgot. Anyway, I noticed this year that lots of the seeds lean towards a cutshort shape.

Verdolino
I received these beans in a trade. I grew it in a pot - bad decision. Another one that will get a proper row the next time it's grown. That said, it dealt well with the limited space and crowding in a pot considering. Here is an online description of it:

"An Italian delicacy from Lucania, the name derives from the color of the seed, a beautiful light green. The Verdolino bean has a distinctive flavor, between the sweetness of the Cannellini bean and the intensity of the Borlotto bean, from which it inherits the not-too-thin skin that makes it suitable for soups."