How small can a bean seed get?

[Pulsegleaner]

Hi all

While doing my seed hunt today I came across a common bean in my sorting that is probably the smallest I have ever seen. If it wasn't for the hilum, I'd swear it was a black mung bean (I was going through mungs, and there are such things as black ones*). Normally I'd have dismissed it as an aborted immature seed, but a common bean aborted that small would be a shriveled mess, and this appears to be full formed. So it looks like I have something else odd to play around with. Compared to this, flageolet beans (including falcone) which I usually think of as the bottom of beans size wise is gigantic.

This has gotten me thinking what is the smallest seeded version of each bean anyone else has seen. Here is my list

Cowpea- I have some black cowpeas that are about the size of a lesser mung bean**

Soybean-I have a soybean seed I retrieved from some Indian Coriander that is the size of a small lentil (for the record, WILD soybean seeds are a bit bigger than that)

Pea- Back when I was in college I would often bump into peas in my searches so small I would get them confused with the vetches (I really wish I still had some of those) while the plants were super duper tiny, as were the pods (about the size of the last joint of my pinkie) they grew super fast (seed to seed in 30-45 days) which is good for my iffy weather.

Fava-Again back in college I once found two blackish brown favas (based on shape) about the size of bb-pellets. I DID plant the sound one (the other was damaged to non-viability) but a bird bit through it, so no clue as to it's final data (for all I know they could just have been some really odd shaped non-fava vetches.)

Mung-some of the mottled ones are even smaller than the standard lesser by about half.\

Azuki-again some as small as the smallest mungs

Urd-Not a lot of specimens on this.

Mothe- a normal mothe bean is about the size of a small mung, but I have ones that are almost down to large sesame seed size.

Lima and Runner -again, I have little experience with these, but I have certainly seen limas no bigger than small common beans and would imagine similarly diminutive runners exist as well.

*Well, most are actually really dark brown, but I have a lesser mung that is truly black.

**Commercial mung beans divide into two general groups, the greater (popular in China, Japan, and India) which is larger, rounder, and slightly browner and the lesser (popular in Thailand and Southeast Asia) which is smaller more cylindrical, and a much brighter shade of green.

 

[aftermidnight]

The smallest bean I have in my collection is the little Comtesse de Chambord, about the size of a grain of rice, maybe a tad bigger..

On left one called 'Little White Rice', on the right 'Comtesse de Chambord'

When I went looking for the little 'Comtesse de Chambord' I couldn't find it sold anywhere in North America. With the help of another bean grower on GW I found it still offered for sale in France but only one place, so I ordered enough to grow myself with enough left over to share. They no longer offer it but I'm happy to say it can be bought from a couple of seed companies here in Canada.
Said to be used as a dry bean but I cook the tiny pods, delicious, raw they are quite sweet but talk about shelling the dry seed one has to be dedicated, it's a fiddly job.
Russ Crow also has another bean with the same name which is one of the parents of his fantastic Blue Jay but it is a little bigger and... I have another CdeC sent to me by an Australian member who posts here on occasion it's small but rounder and a smidge bigger. This version is also grown by someone in England but I do believe the real CdeC is the one shown on the right in the pic above, the one mentioned in the 'Beans of New York'. This little bean was very popular in the last century here in eastern Canada, but seems to have slowly disappeared like so many other heirlooms.
One of the seed companies in the UK is selling one called 'Dutchesse de Chambord', I ordered a packet and looking at the seed it looks the same as my original CdeC.

There's also another so called rice bean, black, red, possible brown but they are Vigna umbellitas where as CdeC's are Phasolus vulgaris.

See I get on a roll when I start talking about beans .

Annette

 

[Pulsegleaner]

I am very familiar with the V. umbellata rice bean, it's what I mostly work with

And yes, they come in brown. Brown, or at least dark tan is actually a commoner color than black, which is almost as rare as blue (though, with the strong cultural bias towards red, ALL other colors are getting roughed out and becoming rare.)

 

[digitS']

Do you think that smaller seed size may be a characteristic selected for by growers of snap beans?

If shelling is too fiddly - a peasant may not be interested in growing many pounds of that variety. Smaller seed size should be desirable if the pods are what are eaten and only seed for growing is saved. And, fiddling with tiny pods and seed can't be much fun or productive works.

A heavier pod tissue is likely to interfere and make it more difficult to shell. I imagine that excessive waste is also a consequence of both hand and mechanical threshing.

Steve

 

[Pulsegleaner]

I'd agree, except that seed size, plant size and pod size are often interrelated heavily. While it is true that snap beans often have smaller seeds than shelling beans there is a lower limit, and most of these are probably below that. Time saved by smaller seed is not worth much if the PODS are themselves too small to be of much use. Those pinkie joint sized pea pods I mentioned are probably the norm for a lot of these. While I have not grown them successfully as of yet (i.e. long enough to make seed back) I imagine the actually pods are about as big around as a fat spaghetti strand when they are still tender enough to eat as snaps; and not nearly as long.

Also remember that smaller pods/seeds also often means a lot more OF them, so picking takes longer for the same net mass of actual food.

If I was to hazard a guess, I would imagine that most of these tinies, if they have any use at all, are used as green manure, a state where the WHOLE PLANT can be made use of. If any seed is actively saved at all, it is probably done via threshing and winnowing, like grain. Most small beans are harvested like grain anyway, so it is an already established process.

 

[aftermidnight]

Another cutie, 'Herrenbohnli' description from Solstice Seeds...
72 days. Very delicate, 5 ft. vines produce diminutive 2 1/2 inch pods with a very sweet, tender flavor. At maturity the pods fill with almst round , pinkish-beige seeds with a faint darkening around the hilum. Surprisingly productive. Supposedly also good as a soup bean. The name means "gentlemen's little bean"

Haven't got around to growing this one yet but it sounds like another good one.

Annette