2018 Little Easy Bean Network - Join Us In Saving Amazing Heirloom Beans

[Blue-Jay]

This time traveler has now returned to June 24, 2018

 

[aftermidnight]

so have I, sometimes it takes awhile for the light bulb to turn on.I deleted and posted here.
I now have flowers on the 3 Piekny Jas runners I planted earlier...

and if you have the time to get a more even germination plant your bean seed vertically (little nubbin) downward, this way the little root doesn't have to twist or turn before heading down .

 

[flowerbug]

so have I, sometimes it takes awhile for the light bulb to turn on.I deleted and posted here.
I now have flowers on the 3 Piekny Jas runners I planted earlier...View attachment 26894
and if you have the time to get a more even germination plant your bean seed vertically (little nubbin) downward, this way the little root doesn't have to twist or turn before heading down .
View attachment 26895

those are such pretty flowers to see. i should be seeing some bean flowers soon on the volunteer mystery bean and the one transplanted bean planting.

i don't think my eyes are good enough to pick out the holes/root nubs of the many dry beans, but it would be good to know if i ever get into pre-sprouting rare beans.

the trouble here with many of the gardens is that the soil is much more clumpy so to get seeds buried and in full soil contact at times i have them down a little too deep so i may have a few here or there that won't germinate. sometimes as they are sprouting i'll be able to use the hose to wash away a little of the clay over them so they can have an easier time breaking free.

i used to use a dibble to plant seeds and had a piece of PVC pipe i would drop seeds down to get into the holes (so i didn't have to bend down at all to plant) - that took too much time. i went back to using a pointed hoe for making a line in the soil at about the right depth and then i go along and drop the seeds at whatever spacing i want. then i use the hoe to cover the seeds and to tamp the soil back down so that there is good soil/seed contact. if i get the depth right the germination rate is pretty high and consistent from good seeds.

sometimes what i think of being a germination problem is instead chipmunk feeding. they seem to be able to smell out and select the plantings where i have my fresh eating bean varieties and some of the shellies too. i've had them eat one or two seeds out of an entire row of other beans where i've poked those few in there to try to hide them and it doesn't work. if i plant enough different places i usually get some of a crop, but to get a large planting of certain beans i'm going to have to resort to a very fine mesh for protection and a hot wire so they can't go over the top.

 

[flowerbug]

beautiful day out today. finally could risk some weeding and i had to anyways because the climbing beans were starting to go through the fine mesh i put around them to protect them - i had to take that off and hoped they'd find the poles/fence nearby.

the one end of that garden (where the bush lima beans are planted plus the climbing lima beans) near the fence was getting overgrown with weeds, we let some miniature hollyhocks go to seed in that area a few times and so it will be several years before they'll stop sprouting in there... it was hard to see bean plants in a few locations. all taken care of now and most of the weeds are now mulching the beans.

 

[flowerbug]

started getting caught up on weeding, for the fine close-up work in between plants i have to sit on the ground and scoot along and that takes time. i do that for a while and then get up and scrape whatever i can with the scuffle hoe and then that's usually enough and i'll take a break.

this afternoon i went out and replanted in some of the larger gaps, filling in with later beans, some will have a chance of finishing in time, but will be interesting to see if any of these have much of a crop. i have plenty of seeds already selected for the Yellow Eye and the Red Ryder and those are usually easy to tell apart from any of the other beans i've planted, except in one area i'll have to check as i'm harvesting pods to make sure certain rows get their own box tops...

for the first time ever i had beans that sprouted and started growing but then rotted from below. i know the cause so i won't repeat the mistake. usually when putting down the worms/worm compost i don't put down a thick layer and i usually perch things above so the drainage for the area is good. this time i had a pretty thick layer and i was using more of a trench to hold the moisture in that location and we've had some pretty heavy rains at times so it probably drowned the roots beyond what they could take. some of the beans survived in spots, but they tended to be towards the ends of the rows and where drainage was better.

i sneaked a few extra rows in along some edges so perhaps those will produce. or not... if anything the beans help keep the weeds down. and i like it when the semi-runners grow up the tall lillies.

 

[flowerbug]

has anyone else been replanting much? i've read about people planting beans every week or every other week or so all season to keep fresh bean production going, but i've not ever really been able to do that much staggered plantings because i want dry beans to harvest as much as i can get...

 

[Michael Lusk]

has anyone else been replanting much? i've read about people planting beans every week or every other week or so all season to keep fresh bean production going, but i've not ever really been able to do that much staggered plantings because i want dry beans to harvest as much as i can get...

I've planted a few more seeds this past week to try to fill in where I lost plants. But, I'm not sure the new seeds will have the time to produce like I'd like. And, they aren't really in the best planned spots.

Last year, I planted the climbing beans which we eat fresh every couple of weeks through May and June and that worked out well. The last plants ended up being my 'seed' beans for this years planting.

 

[Zeedman]

has anyone else been replanting much? i've read about people planting beans every week or every other week or so all season to keep fresh bean production going, but i've not ever really been able to do that much staggered plantings because i want dry beans to harvest as much as i can get...

Back when I grew bush beans (Tendergreen was my favorite), I made at least two separate plantings. Since all of the snap beans I grow now are pole, I never find the need to stagger planting. The pole beans will go non-stop until frost. I do sometimes have to re-plant the bare spots in the rows, though.

 

[flowerbug]

Back when I grew bush beans (Tendergreen was my favorite), I made at least two separate plantings. Since all of the snap beans I grow now are pole, I never find the need to stagger planting. The pole beans will go non-stop until frost. I do sometimes have to re-plant the bare spots in the rows, though.

for some reason i've always liked wax beans more than the green beans, but that doesn't mean i don't like the green beans too... my favorite green bean for flavor here was a long experimental variety, it always had tons of beans but had a very tough time setting any viable seeds and the few that you got were very hard to get out of the shell. so this year i didn't plant any as last year i wasted half a garden growing them and not picking the beans because i wanted to replenish my seed supply. i didn't even get as many seeds back as i planted.

while blue lake are acceptable in flavor i'm not all that in love with them. i like to eat beans fresh from the garden as i'm picking.

i'm glad i planted what i did yesterday, because it is raining cats and dogs now out there. the forecast called for rain last night and today so i wanted to get them in and ready for these rains.

 

[reedy]

All my beans are coming along pretty well with exception of Dr. Martin. Three of four seeds sprouted. One died soon after. One did the weirdest thing I'v ever seen, it came up with a big fat stem in an arch. It just kept getting bigger and I kept thinking it will pull its seed leaves out of the ground but it didn't. I couldn't tell which end was which but I risked digging it up and lucked in to finding the right end and exposed the leaves. So, I thought it will grow now, but instead the stem just kept getting fatter and bigger and growing in a coil, it looked like a darned slinky, with those little yellowing seed leaves on the end. Never even tried to grow any true leaves so I finally plucked it out. Goofy thing was freaking me out.
The one remaining plant started climbing but then leaves started yellowing and drying up. It had some new stems starting from lower leaves joints so I cut the top of it off and now it doesn't look too bad, a little bushy for a pole bean but starting to climb again. Will see how it turns out.

Bonus beans, Snowstorm and Rosie Clare look the best, they have topped their 8' trellises and getting ready to bloom. They are ahead cause I planted them while there was still risk of being too cold but the other network beans are catching up now.