The 2014 Little Easy Bean Network - Get New Beans On The Cheap

[Blue-Jay]

I made the rounds last night, taking more field notes on the 40 varieties I have growing this year. I am going to have to make myself a chart of sorts to simplify note taking. It would be nice to just check a box rather than have to write so much out.

Most of the bush varieties are finishing up and will be ready to collect soon. Excited!

Russ, both Star 2056 and Molley's Zebra are full of pods now and both turned out to be snap beans.

About half of the beans on Molley's Zebra have a purple blush with a purple line. The other half are pretty much plain green as you can see from the first two pics. The vines started out reddish, but turned green as they went up. The blooms are lavender. I have them on a 7' pole and I think they'd keep going if they could, a very healthy and vigorous climber. Pods are 6-7" long, plump, string-less, sweet and juicy, rather smooth and almost fuzz-less. The yield is very good. The first pods were ready to pick in snap bean stage last week. (I'll get the DTM calculated for you and days to dry pods after a bit. These were planted on June 7th.)

I really like Molley's Zebra and will definitely plant her again.

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Star 2056 (below) is a compact bush growth habit. Very small white blooms come on thickly all at once. Pods are slender and pencil-round (what you'd call a filet bean?), about 6" long, string-less, very heavy yields on such a small plant, not particularly tender or sweet, but I have enough to cook up a handful to better judge their flavor. These were planted on June 14th.

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Won't be much longer 'til I'll be putting your beans in the mail.

I also really like the Gold of Bacau that @marshallsmyth gave me. I need to get a pic of their huge, yellow wax pods. They are so pretty. (And tasty!)

Hi Journey,

Great looking pictures the beans look so healthy. So fun to see them, and how they are all turning out. I kinda figured the Star 2056 would be a snap bean. Probably a commercial one at one time. There were several Star beans I sent out this year. They had similar sized seed, and will probably be similar in pods as well. Very neat looking pods. Oh and the Molley's Zebra. Excellent ! Another pole snap bean to try out sometime. It's so neat the seeds grew. They are all stronger now in their fresh seed. Thanks again for your efforts.

 

[Hal]

Hi Hal,

Just curious do you ever grow pole beans?

I sure do! I've got a whole bunch of them and would struggle to name a single favourite.
I'm quite fond of climbing wax beans as they seem to be even more scarce then bush wax beans.

 

[ninnymary]

Marshall, check your inbox. I sent you a message.

 

[aftermidnight]

Russ, the beans arrived in this mornings mail, thanks a bunch, 'Maria Zeller' sure has pretty seed, have you tried it as a snap or a full bean?

Annette

 

[Blue-Jay]

Russ, the beans arrived in this mornings mail, thanks a bunch, 'Maria Zeller' sure has pretty seed, have you tried it as a snap or a full bean?

Annette

Hi There,

Glad the little package made it. I don't think the Maria Zeller has snap bean uses. You can try cooking a couple of pods and see how they are. Very productive dry bean. I think you will also enjoy Louisiana. Really kicks out wonderful, flavourful snap beans. Very productive.

 

[Hal]

Marshall, check your inbox. I sent you a message.

I'm guessing they have still not fixed his internet problem.

 

[897tgigvib]

Howdy all. My internet is fixed. Now it's my generator out, so on solar power only. Have to count my watts.

 

[Hal]

Howdy all. My internet is fixed. Now it's my generator out, so on solar power only. Have to count my watts.

Glad to hear the internet is fixed!
Shame about that generator though.

 

[Blue-Jay]

Yea Marshall's back! We so missed you.

I harvested seed from 8 of my 20 bush bean rows yesterday. There is more out there. I'll be out again clipping pods today. Looks like Billingsgate is breaking out into another color. When the pods dry down some more and the seed takes on it's more natural color I will take a picture and put it up here. I'm excited. Looks like it's going to be a fun seed harvest. All my plants are just loaded with pods.

 

[897tgigvib]

Ganymede!

Oh my God, I think it is the ace number one most beautiful Lima bean in the world!

Ganymede; Too beautiful to continue pronouncing

Gan i meed (i as in the i in big or in little).

Gan imidee is how I pronounce it now.

A true tricolored Lima of soft white with a subtle pinkishness in the white, lines of deep dark black chocolate running through a field of native brick reddish fuchsia pink!

Neptune! One plant of them is consistently making black seeds with small beige flecking.
Two other plants of Neptune are making them like the planted seeds.

Billingsgate! What an amazing outcross! I must photo what I got from 6 different plants. Each was different. One made seed similar to the planted seeds. Another was similarly marked but the brown has a strong bluish cast. Another made mostly blue that flecks into the white. Another made brown with beige/white. The prettiest one is mostly bone white with a brown soldier type eye with small brown dots in the white the way alice and eden do with their colors.

Billingsgate plants were one of those that produced heavily, almost all at once, each plant taking its turn producing, and then died in the heat and drought. I got good production from them. I do think there will be some more varieties from the 5 seeds left that I didn't plant this year, and also from the next generation.

I will soon be taking some photos.