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[flowerbug]

a first today:

while shelling some of the Meraviglia di Venezia there were two beans in the same spot in the pod kind of wrapped around each other like they were twins. i'd never seen anything like that before in all the millions of beans i've shelled over the years...

 

[Blue-Jay]

@flowerbug said,

"While shelling some of the Meraviglia di Venezia there were two beans in the same spot in the pod kind of wrapped around each other like they were twins. i'd never seen anything like that before in all the millions of beans i've shelled over the years..."

That truely sounds out of the ordinary, but as the old saying goes there's a first time for everything.

My gardening season is now throwing a negative wrinkle at me with so much heavy rain just at the time I should be harvesting my best dry pods. Two nights ago 6 inches of rain over night. Yesterday night 1 inch overnight then 2 inches in the morning and 2 inches yesterday afternoon. About a week and half ago we had about 4 inches. More than 3 months worth of rain in a week and a half. I think we made up for our dry March, April, July, and August.

Been pulling up mature plants and driving poles in the ground with longs screws sticking out of the poles to hang the semi runner and bush plants on them to get them off the damp ground.

 

[flowerbug]

@flowerbug said,

"While shelling some of the Meraviglia di Venezia there were two beans in the same spot in the pod kind of wrapped around each other like they were twins. i'd never seen anything like that before in all the millions of beans i've shelled over the years..."

That truely sounds out of the ordinary, but as the old saying goes there's a first time for everything.

My gardening season is now throwing a negative wrinkle at me with so much heavy rain just at the time I should be harvesting my best dry pods. Two nights ago 6 inches of rain over night. Yesterday night 1 inch overnight then 2 inches in the morning and 2 inches yesterday afternoon. About a week and half ago we had about 4 inches. More than 3 months worth of rain in a week and a half. I think we made up for our dry March, April, July, and August.

Been pulling up mature plants and driving poles in the ground with longs screws sticking out of the poles to hang the semi runner and bush plants on them to get them off the damp ground.

View attachment 28272
View attachment 28273

i meant to get a picture of them together... they were attached to each other right at the connecting point to the pod but not otherwise connected to each other (they were not Siamese Twins). if i ever see it again i'm going to take a pic for sure if they stay connected long enough.

it's been a wild time here too with all the rains. the water table has to be pretty high the way the sump pump has been running.

i've been pulling some plants then taking all the pods off and bringing them inside to finish drying. if i'd left things outside much longer i doubt i'd have had much of a harvest. as it is i'm finding a lot of beans sprouting or rotting in the pods.

i should be out today getting some gardens scanned again, but i told myself to take it easy for a few days so i can let my leg rest and also to get caught up on some initial shelling so i can have enough containers for the next round. i can shell without stressing my leg. besides it's hard for me to pick pods and not check them out to see how they've done...

 

[aftermidnight]

Update on "Only the Lonely" (RALPH'S ITALIAN) I had a look at it today, not only has it topped the magnolia tree and is making it's way downward, it has also branched and now threading it's way through the wisteria on the pergola, this I may be able to cover it if the weather turns.
Loads of flowers still coming now and yes, we can see small beans forming. Keeping my fingers crossed.
The second batch of dried on the vine 'PIEKNY JAS' pods are brittle dry and ready for picking, the first batch have already been packaged and were sent out last week. @Zeedman do you have this one?

Annette

 

[Zeedman]

No, @aftermidnight , I don't have that one yet. I wouldn't be able to grow them for a while (will be focusing on APS & Insuk's next year), but if you can spare some seed, I'll keep it in the freezer until I can grow it. It looks like a good bean. I hope you will get a chance to taste a few, I look forward to hearing your review. It's been a loooonnnngg time spent searching for it, I hope your vines appreciate what you went through to get them.

Really heavy rains here too; my makeshift rain gauge (a 5-gallon bucket left outside) has over 12" of rain from the last 10 days (about 3" last night). Very late in the season for such severe weather (tornado watch again just West of me), more like June than September. Surprisingly, it hasn't (yet) done serious damage to the beans drying down. DW & I have been literally going into the gardens between rains, picking any pod that is close to drying, and bringing them indoors under a fan.

Lots of Cave Dweller Black limas & Thai Soldier cowpeas already shelled, and Bosnian Pole bean & 3-Feet-Plus yardlong are beginning to ripen in large numbers. I am most concerned about the yardlong seed, since it is very susceptible to damage from moisture.

 

[aftermidnight]

@Zeedman , as soon as the dried on the vine pods have been picked and air dried for a few days they will be in the mail, My main objective with these are to get them spread around . But I will taste test a few.

Annette

 

[flowerbug]

i wasn't supposed to do much today either, but with the rains in the forecast again i went out and picked through the lima beans. got some shellies while i was at it. made for a very nice lunch. i checked through the red lima beans too while i was there and brought in those and also had a few of those as shellies and had to try them out. the skin is a bit thicker but the flavor is good.

i wonder how many years it will be before i see the first cross and if they are similar to regular beans where the cross doesn't show up for a few seasons or is it right away?

i now have more lima beans finishing drying in more boxtops and then they'll go in the large bag i keep them in until i get caught up on all the other picking and shelling. i need all the many boxtops, containers and floor space from all the other small amounts of beans drying around...

 

[Zeedman]

i wonder how many years it will be before i see the first cross and if they are similar to regular beans where the cross doesn't show up for a few seasons or is it right away?

How many different limas did you grow? If there are crosses this year, the seed for all varieties would still appear normal. If that seed were planted next year, some of the crosses would appear. Even if you rogue out those first crosses, other crosses might still appear in consecutive years, as recessive traits begin to be expressed. It can be really difficult to unscramble that egg.

The good news is that unlike crosses in snap beans (which may have poor eating qualities), any crosses between limas should still be usable, and might even be enjoyable.

 

[flowerbug]

How many different limas did you grow? If there are crosses this year, the seed for all varieties would still appear normal. If that seed were planted next year, some of the crosses would appear. Even if you rogue out those first crosses, other crosses might still appear in consecutive years, as recessive traits begin to be expressed. It can be really difficult to unscramble that egg.

The good news is that unlike crosses in snap beans (which may have poor eating qualities), any crosses between limas should still be usable, and might even be enjoyable.

just the two, the generic Fordhook bush lima beans and the network Red pole lima beans. good to know, as usual the odds are pretty long because only a few beans get planted each season and they're selected based upon condition so if there are any reasons in the crossed bean where it looks slightly wrong i may pass it up and not know it...

by adding the network bean to my collection i doubled my lima bean count! lol

the Fordhook lima beans have done reasonably well here but two things they do which adding more varieties may avoid. the Red pole lima beans will have less beans/pods in the dirt and perhaps i can get rid of the trait where the beans don't develop fully and instead just abort earlier or make smaller beans instead. last year with the Fordhooks because of the drought about 80% of the beans weren't properly formed. i'd have much rather had them abort and drop the pods than do that or just had smaller beans. i'm not sure what the condition is actually called in the industry.

so far this season with fairly regular rains and me making sure there has been enough water when we've had a few dry spells i've not seen so many malformed beans in the Fordhooks and none in the Red limas...

and good to know about the edibility issue with the limas. i kinda figured that out indirectly from your previous post where you said they're all shellies. we really love lima beans here so i'm glad to hear that.

any observations about soils they like and other conditions appreciated too as right now most of them are grown in pretty heavy clay soil and while they do ok i know they could go better once i get more organic material added to those gardens.

oh, and do you ever see nitrogen fixing nodules on the roots of them?

p.s. i'm glad this is a bean thread and i can ask so many questions... lol i still have a lot to learn.

 

[flowerbug]

in my spring planting list i included several crosses that showed up the past few years in my harvested seeds.

it looks like most of them have returned as planted so they're stable enough to work with. i may not have enough yet to cook some of them up to see how they taste but at least i can verify they'll continue so i can expand the amount next season to do a trial cook of the dry form.

since this is still what i consider "Early" in the harvest i've also verified a few as early and that's good to know for planting next season so i can put them in with each other instead of having them overgrown by the longer season types. this always presents a problem for me if i plant them too closely as the early beans get dried out and ready to pick but are then overgrown and some will develop white mold. which can then ruin some of the surrounding plants. while i don't practice pristine habits (on purpose - i want to continue breeding plants that can resist diseases instead of ones that depend upon special treatment) if i can at least know what spacings and timings work better at least i can improve my seeds and results - it does make sense to do that if i can.

of the list i planted Sunset and the Red Goats Eye were the two i was most curious about and both of those returned in similar form and are early.

several of the Yellow Eye selections also seem to have returned as planted so they're golden to me as they are also somewhat earlier (not easy to verify because of my limited plantings of them so it's still tentative). alas i had a very nice stand of plants next to the onions and they were growing so nicely and looking so good and then a very heavy rain knocked some over and broke them off. i left them alone to see if they'd survive and all the plants did. i'm going to try to snap a picture of one of the plants how it healed that break. it's amusing/interesting. but a lot of pods were sitting on the dirt for those and a lot of beans didn't form/finish right, but i still have a harvest from that line of plants... a block planting would have been perhaps more protective for them (protecting each other).