2015 Little Easy Bean Network - Old Beans Should Never Die !

[Blue-Jay]

Hi @journey11

The seeds you grew arrived today. Many thanks for the extras. The seed is just beautiful. Please come back again next year.

 

[Blue-Jay]

Even though my big bean garden was a basic failure this year. Everything I planted around the house grew very nicely. Will Bonsall former long time member of The Seed Savers Exchange, and running his own project called The Scattered Seed Project. He currently has a new project called Grass Roots Seed Network. Will sent to me earlier this year a box with over 50 packets of outcross seeds he had been saving. He remembered that I enjoyed working with the outcrosses and so sent them to me. I tried growing about half of them. Several of them did not grow, but I did get some new segregations out of the ones I did plant and thought it could be the basis of a little Bean Fashion show this year. Not as good as last years, but better than nothing and better than TV. What would the Little Easy Bean Network thread be without our annual Bean Fashion Show?

I thought I might do this bean show in two parts some today and perhaps the rest tomorrow or the next day.

The bean all the way to the left I'm told came from Black Valentine which is a black seeded, green podded snap bush variety. I got two different seed coats and the plants grew as pole beans. One grew long purple pods. That I'm guessing would be the buff colored seed to the right. Every purple poded bean I've ever seen has this light cream tan colored seed. I'm thinking the characteristic for purple pods and the light tan seed coat is probably linked on the same gene. The other pole plant grew long green pods with a purple blush. I would guess that's the one in the center. I tried chewing on a few of the pods from these plants and they seem like they would make nice stringless snap beans.

The seed on the left is from Mapie and was marked as being harvested in 2009. This seed is shorter than Mapie's black and white seed, and grew as a bush. I got back exactly the same seed on the right.

The seed on the left is from Hawksbury Wonder. Will told me he didn't know if he actually had an outcross from Hawksbury or if he was just getting two slightly different shades of seed. Hawksbury Wonder has a large purple kidney shaped seed. Well I also got two different shades of seed from what Will thought was an outcross. All the plants from the original seed grew as a bush.

The seed on the left is also from Hawksbury Wonder and I got back a similar seed in the center and a pink one on the right. All the plants from the original seed grew as a bush.

The seed on the left is an outcross from a bush variety called Early Stearns. Early Stearns is an original bean from former member of SSE the late Robert Lobitz. I have never seen seeds of Early Stearns, but a description in the 2008 SSE yearbook describes the seed as long white with a variable hilum, some res. The seed in the center looks like the original must have looked when it was harvested new. I also got a bonus of a second color.

The seed on the left is outcrossed seed from a bush variety called Kebariki. It is my understanding the Kebariki seed is purple splashed with white. The seed from this summer's growing in the center could be similar to how the original seed may have looked when it was harvested new in 2009. I also got a buff colored seed on the right.

The seed on the left is an outcross from a variety called Andrew Kent. Andrew Kent is said to have buff colored seed with maroon mottling. The seed I got on the right looks like many, many horticultuarl bean varieties I've seen.

 

[897tgigvib]

@NancyJ10x The Badda di Polizzi beans don't produce their full coloration until they've been stored a few months, no matter how mature they get picked. Look at them again in February after they've been stored good and dry. Surprise, there will be that beige coloration.

I think there is a kind of pigment that several varieties of beans make which take several months to show. Probably several pigments actually. Another variety called Dapple Grey shows silver grey at first which then ages to a nice silvery brown.

Normally those Flor de Mayo and Yoeme varieties make very tall growing vines.

But the Dow Purple pod should have grown to 12 feet, and should have been the fastest growing bean you've ever seen. I'd like to see photos of those Dow vines. They should be rugged and thick vines with purple shading. Dow is adapted to grow anywhere practically. I grew ancestors of your seeds for years in Montana, zone barely 4. Not growing with extreme vigor makes me wonder if they outcrossed. And THAT would be very very interesting indeed.

 

[Blue-Jay]

Hi @marshallsmyth,

The box of beans you sent to me this past spring looked like they contained most if not all your original bean collection. Did you keep seeds of them for yourself. I hope you didn't entrust your entire collection to me although I would appreciate your thoughtfulness and trust in that regards.

 

[Blue-Jay]

Today will be the second and last round of my 2015 Bean Fashion Show. Hope you will enjoy it.

I had only one original seed left on the left of an outcross from Torkeny Vis. The beans grew as a half runner and gave me the two segregation to the right, and the one below. What i thought was pretty amazing was the orginal seed was marked as having been harvested in 2007. So 8 year old seed was still growing.

Sort of a dark Soldier type marked seed.

The outcrossed seed on the left harvested in 2009 came from a variety called Viktorka a half runner bean. The seed in the center is dark maked with red markings which barely show up against that dark base color, but this is probaby how the orignal outcross on the left looked when it was new. The bean on the right was another segregation of this grow out and was light tan with brown markings.

Another outcross on the right from Robert Lobitz bean "Early Stearns". The seed I received was harvested in 2006. 9 year old seed. I got the three segregations from the grow out including the one below. One solid purple and the other a darker shade of purple with white on the end. The plants all grew as a bush.

Another segregation from the Early Stearns outcross above.

The outcrossed seed on the left is from a bean called "Black Canterbury. I got two segregations that grew as bush plants.

The packet of outcrossed seed on the left came from a pole bean called Noridgewock"
The packet and longer and rounded seed mixed. So I picked out a few of each to grow and I got back those two types of seed back again. I'm sure the original seed was patterned like the fresh seed when it was new. Both grow outs grew as pole plants.

 

[Blue-Jay]

Bean Fashion Show continued

The outcrossed seed on the left comes from a bean called "Andrew Kent" which is a bush horticultural plant seeds of which are light tan with red streaks and speckles. I got back a few seeds on the right like the outcrossed seeds, and a horticultural type in the center.

The outcross seed on the upper left was a mixed packet said to have come from "Bobolink" Bobolink is a pole bean with seeds about half white and half maroon red. I got back these four segregations. The one on the lower left is the most interesting looking seed of the bunch.

The outcrossed seed on the left is from a bean called "Tenser Kidney". All the kidney beans I've seen all grow as bush plants. I don't know if I planted the red ones in this mixed packet but I seemed to wind up with the rounded black ones on the right, and they grew as pole plants.

So this ends the 2015 Bean Fashion Show from my garden here in Woodstock, Illinois.

 

[Blue-Jay]

Last year in 2014 this bean below was on my Bean Fashion Show on page 93. It's the third set of pictures on my post on the left. Marshall might have sent some of these seeds out to anyone. It's a Billingsgate segregation that popped out of Billingsgate in 2014. Billingsgate was discovered in my garden in 2013. I have named the bean and thought I would clue anyone in that had the seed. Name for this bean is now "Drops Of Blue" I got 32 small seeds of this one out of my pathetic 2015 garden. I didn't see any new segregating out of this one, but of course I was seeing seed out of a limited number of plants. Will give it another planting next year from last years seed.

DROPS OF BLUE

 

[897tgigvib]

Howdy Russ,
I also sent large envelopes of seeds to "flowerweaver" and to Lisa Bloodnick, and I think to Cary Bradley. I had so little time to move! I do recall at least 3 folks got samples each of most of my collection, and several others got samples of some of my collection.

Also, I poured some few beans each of most of my collection into 2 large coffee cans and sealed them to keep no matter what happened to me. I still have those.Unmarked, unlabeled, but I do have them. Emergency spares. I also have one tupperware type container about the size of a shoebox which has some of the packets I got from you Russ, those from the 2014 fashion show, safe and sound.

I do plan on growing at least some beans in the 2016 season. There are at least 2 small spots that I can grow some, and there may be another lining up for me.

I actually can send to whoever would like, some selected and (attempted to anyway), sorted beans from the 2 coffee cans. Mostly those are the same ones which are in the little easy bean collection pages on your website.

Oh, just remembering, I think I sent some to journey and baymule, but i might be remembering wrong. Also, there's a young man from facebook named Levi who I traded about 20 varieties with. I think (hope) I sent at least some of each of those I got from him to you.

2015...I think I win the award for having the worst year of anyone this year. All the work I was doing for that garden up there at pillsbury put to nothing. I was almost done refurbishing the soil, making it heavier for drought, adding bonemeal and tiny amounts of fishmeal, and doing the beds right.

well, forward to 2016, right?

Russ, there were so many other cool ones besides the billingsgate outcrosses, which really is a cool outcross. I think that was a wide subspecies outcross.

Ringwood made everysingle plant different, and each was VERY special. One made nice edible looking green pods on a large, definitely determinate bush which had certain aspects of making me think it would make purple pods, but instead, were nice and green, almost appalachian. Plant was very large bush. Another ringwood was probably a half runner indeterminate, and made edible looking pods with some strings, but had real nice purple stripes all subtle like on them, the seeds were dark brown with dark vermillion pinto marked, as if they'd segregate some more. Another one was a tall pole that made almost black pods and smallish black seeds.

The evening moon made those awesome outcrosses too. the wax pickler that stayed fresh ultra slow to ripen dry, this one has agricultural potential! So does that eclipse moon turtle bean.

 

[ninnymary]

Marshall, I wish the best for you this next growing season. I so enjoyed having you as a friend on TEG and reading all of your posts.

Mary

 

[aftermidnight]

@Bluejay77 , Your paperwork arrived in yesterday's mail, I got off my duff, filled in everything needed and covered the yellow and green sticker on the front of the envelope with clear tape. I put two lots of forty each of the Prizewinner bean seeds in clear ziplocks along with all the paperwork, stuffed it in a bubble envelope and mailed it off today, so it is now heading your way, it will be interesting to see how long it will take to get through all the red tape, but might be worth it in the long run. As I said I don't know how old the seed I've sent is as I got them from someone who got them from someone else. It might be worth doing a germination test on a couple of them.
Annette