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

[TheSeedObsesser]

SeedObesser,

I thought you were going to move this summer? If you think you can still grow some dry seed some of the bush varieties that I have left would be your best bet. However your first dry pods will just be at about the 90 to 100 day mark. Then to get most of the rest your seed crop you will need about another 30 days.

We might end up moving Sept. 1st. We're contemplating seeing if we can rent for a few more years or just buying the house, things are starting to look better. I'm fairly positive that I could get at least some dry seed back to you as long as I don't get the seed in late. I'll just hand the first dry seeds that I get over to you and take the later ones for myself.

Can I choose anything that's available on your website, or do you have a list for this year's bean network?

 

[buckabucka]

I'm excited to try this! I think I will set the two poles in the hoop houses, as that will extend the season and help a lot if we have a rainy fall.

 

[TheSeedObsesser]

We might end up moving Sept. 1st. We're contemplating seeing if we can rent for a few more years or just buying the house, things are starting to look better. I'm fairly positive that I could get at least some dry seed back to you as long as I don't get the seed in late. I'll just hand the first dry seeds that I get over to you and take the later ones for myself.

Can I choose anything that's available on your website, or do you have a list for this year's bean network?

Would Kneply's Forty Bushel be alright?

 

[Ridgerunner]

Russ I fully agree with you on the value of mulching. I mulch my pole and bush beans. I generally lay 2 or 3 layers of newspaper down and cover that with what straw or year old wood chips. It really keeps the weeds and grass down, makes any weeds that do get through easy to pull, and reduces moisture loss. What little mulch is left the next spring gets dug into the soil. Even the year old wood chips are pretty much gone. But even if the beans are laying on mulch, if it is wet, the dried beans can still sprout or rot. I'll keep picking my well dried out ones if rain threatens.

 

[Blue-Jay]

SeedObsesser,

The beans you have to choose from for the bean network this year are all the photos on the first page of this thread. Not all are available anymore so you and I may have to write back and forth on this one to get your choices set. Nobody has taken any of the unknown growth habit ones yet. If you take and grow two from the start of this thread then you can have one free off my website.

 

[Blue-Jay]

Journey was also saying how impenetrable those grass clippings are. The strands of grass are so fine they make a mat that sunlight can't get through, but yet allowing water to filter through. The grass also does such a fine job creating a barrier between those maturing pods and the soil which can really start to decay pods especially when the soil is damp. The soil is also full of bacteria which helps to degrade the drying pods.

I did find that tilling in the matted clippings into the soil at the end of the season was a tough job for my tiller, but I just had to keep working at it. Just a soon as I get some better weather here I'm going to get to my bean plot and try tilling it some more to get last years clippings to break down even better.

However I'm definitely sold on mulching with grass clippings. It surely seems to create healthier plants that you are growing.

 

[897tgigvib]

I planted that last bed in the main section of my garden yesterday. It received the second planting of the pole beans minus the Limas, and there was enough room in it for 7 more outcross varieties to be planted in it, also second plantings.

So, the entire front section is planted. That was first. And now the entire main section is planted.

This morning I began on that back section. Each of the 2 beds back there need more framing and an overhaul of design. Kind of designing as I go along, an averaging of the easiest and the best directions. But I have the base of one bed "double dug" and partially filled with base soil so far. Another 4 inches of base will do it, but at this stage I need to begin increasing the height of the frame one the one side, and the other side needs framing against the path bottom level of the main garden which it is next to. See, that part used to be a hillside slope down toward the lake. I retaining walled it a few years ago, and had let the bed there slope down.

I found I really could not GOPHERPROOF that bed on a slope without leaving one side very shallow. Also, I had made it so that to get to the other side required an 80 foot walk around to get there, lol! So I am opening one side, and will make simple steps going down.

The way I am now doing this bed, so far so good, it will have 20 good inches of base soil, under that, the native clay soil loosened up mixed with some composty soil one shovel deep. The soil in the antigopher cage will be 12 inches of fine forest compost, sieved at half inch grid. That by itself will be some hard work. I believe this bed will take 10 to 14 days to finish barring unforeseen circumstances.

It will be planted with the rest of the outcrosses that need second planting, 14 of them. 2 seeds each. That bed will be over 4 feet by 20 feet, antigopher caged. I believe there will be room for a second planting of some or all the Limas in it also.

The very last bed will be 2 or 3 feet by 24 feet caged. I think I'll be able to plant one more seed each of the stable varieties, bush in that bed.

 

[897tgigvib]

That bed in the back section is getting close to done. Today I got 2 loads of forest topsoil, and need 3 more. This weekend I'll work on the antigopher cage for itm, and monday and tuesday should have it prepared to plant beans.

I have 10 varieties of outcross beans left to plant, and they will take about 90 inches of this bed. Then the north part of this bed will be 5 or 6 of the Lima bean second planting. The other Limas will be in the berry bed.

Soon as this bed is done I begin work on the last bed back section. That bed will get one plant each of the bush stable varieties.

I want to get ambitious after that and make another bed fit in the front section!

 

[baymule]

I have a Jugo Botswana bean up!! That would be one. Waiting impatiently on the rest. I also have several of the Giant Red Tarka beans up too!

 

[897tgigvib]

Oh boy I have lots of little bean plants growing nicely.

Those Nyimo African Beans definitely look like a different Genus. They are the Groundnut Beans. So far so good with them. They sprout with their cotyledons remaining in the ground, and up come deep reddish green leaves.

2 of the Purple Queen look really nice, the third is struggling along real good, looking like a bug ate at the first two leaves. Only received 3 seeds of those so gotsta make sure all 3 plants do good.

All told, so far I've gotten 94% germination.

Both the Ganymede Lima seeds I'd planted did not sprout and were soft dead in the soil, so I replanted 2 seeds at their spots. Same with "Grandma Rivera's" Lima Beans.

I did use the 2 empty half wine barrels to plant bean seeds in. One of them got 2 seeds each of 2 bush varieties, the other got 2 seeds of one bush variety, and the other bush variety only one seed of, the chickasaw outcross #2, last seed.

Anytime I plant a last seed is a special moment.

The seedlings up and growing represent about half my bean plantings. The other half include seeds just starting to show above ground, and the 2 beds not yet done and planted.

There is still time, but not for wasting!