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

[Blue-Jay]

@Decoy1,

I'm sure there are varieties circulating around with more than one name. Sometimes people forget a beans name and grow it for years and pass it on to someone else and have lost track of the name. The new grower renames the bean. Sometimes spelling errors give beans more than one name. I know of a case in the Seed Savers Exchange yearbook were one of the listers of a bean acquired the same bean as I did from the same source. The source had the bean "Holy" listed under the Category of climbing beans. I listed the bean by it's name "Holy". This other lister typed their entry as "Holy Climbing". So there is a case that I know of, that a bean now has two names. Both entries now do appear in the Seed Savers Exchange yearbook one right after the other. "Holy" and "Holy Climbing".

Also without beans having more than one name. Colors, seed shapes and patterns are repeatable in beans which probably makes a grower wonder somtimes if two beans that look so similar. Might be the same variety. You could take note of the pod shape among beans that seem so similar. Or other characteristics as blossom or pod color, and maturity time. Height of growth or leaf size and texture. Somethings that could make two seemingly similar beans really different.

However there are beans circulating with more than one name.

Speaking of beans with two names. I saw the bean Edogava Zuranacki Namame on a Facebook bean group I belong too. Looked like the exact same seed. The fellow that loaded the beans photo called it. La Tigre Rouge or Red Tiger. He told me the name I have is Japanese. EZN is how I acquired the bean. Do I leave it that way? I kind of like the sound of the French name. Could it just really be two look-a-like beans. Makes one wonder sometimes.

 

[Blue-Jay]

@aftermidnight,

Nice articles on those beans. Thanks for finding those. She's a good writter too. Love here descriptions. I grew Major Cook's two years ago. Never tried them as a snap bean, but to watch them grow was a delight and the production of pods just amazed me.

 

[flowerbug]

...

Not the best pic but if you look hard you can see a few pods and leaves way up there, that 2x4 bottom of pic is about the 5-6 ft. level of the pole. Yesterday we put an umbrella over a few pods we could reach in hopes of keeping rain and frost off them. I believe Victory Seed may be planning to grow this one again in 2020 but until then wish me luck this one may be the only one in town. In the end when the weather really turns we'll TRY to pull the vine and hang it in the greenhouse to dry down. Oh the adventures of a bean grower .

Annette

i *heart* you guys so much! hope it gets a few viable beans for you. with that strong of a growth it sure seems like it's trying.

 

[flowerbug]

what a beautiful day outside.

was able to pick some beans and get all of them shelled.

the latest bean the Munachedda Pale did have a few pods starting to turn color so i did bring those in to look at further. shelled and drying...

we really enjoyed this last crop of lima shellies, i did those first so i could cook them up.

 

[Decoy1]

my more usual problem with large beans in our heat/soils is that they just don't finish very well. either they're empty seeds/pods or the seed coat isn't closed up all the way or ..

Yes, I've found this to be the case too. I have Jembo Polish, which is a large flattish-podded bean, and it has been so slow to mature that I might not get any advanced enough to save as seed or dried beans. On the other hand, the other large one I have is Italian Snap from beansandherbs.co.uk which has been a little slow but has just about managed to produce a fair crop of drying pods. But it's interesting that the larger flatter-podded beans seem later - not that I have enough to make any sweeping statements.

 

[Zeedman]

View attachment 28544On a different topic, I’m wondering whether there are many beans in circulation which have different names but are actually the same variety. I have two which look very similar - Major Cook and Mrs Fortune’s. I haven’t closely observed the growth habit and realise the similarities could be superficial but it raised the general point for me of how far there are duplicate varieties in circulation.
I took a photo with the original seeds of the two varieties. Helpfully informed by the last few contributions - many thanks - I now realise that oxidation has been at work on the original seeds which have simply been stored in paper packets.

There are quite a few beans which have acquired multiple names - including Jembo Polish. Some apparently think it should be spelled "Jumbo" and "correct" it, with the best of intentions. I grow it too, and although it isn't a bad snap, I prefer to grow it for its large, flavorful shellies. Other beans which I've noted to have multiple names are Goose, Kentucky Goose, Pumpkin Bean, and Ma Williams, which all appear to be nearly identical in habit, color, and flavor. The ubiquitous large white runner beans which are so common in Europe seem to have a different name in each region, and at least when grown here, are often indistinguishable. It further muddies the waters when the names of beans (and other vegetables) are translated from their original language, or given new names because the original name was lost as they were passed down to others. Last but not least, there are some (including seed companies) which intentionally rename something so as to offer a "new" variety. It's a tangled web.

However, as colorful as different beans are, there are only so many combinations possible... and beans which are similar (or identical) in appearance can be very different. As an example, I grow two different white-seeded pole beans; Kentucky Wonder White #191 (itself probably a synonym for Ferry Morse Pole #191) and Brita's Foot Long. In habit, pod, and seed, you couldn't tell the two apart side by side. Brita's is a tasty dry bean; but KWW #191 was bred as a snap, and its seeds are far less flavorful. I have to make a point of not growing them in the same year, or spacing them so far apart that there is little chance of them crossing... because there would be no visual means to undo that cross.

 

[Zeedman]

Yes, I've found this to be the case too. I have Jembo Polish, which is a large flattish-podded bean, and it has been so slow to mature that I might not get any advanced enough to save as seed or dried beans. On the other hand, the other large one I have is Italian Snap from beansandherbs.co.uk which has been a little slow but has just about managed to produce a fair crop of drying pods. But it's interesting that the larger flatter-podded beans seem later - not that I have enough to make any sweeping statements.

IMO, that observation is a pretty good generalization. In my garden, the round-podded filet beans (such as Fortex and Emerite) and large-seeded beans with flat pods (such as Jembo Polish and Bird Egg #3) tend to take the longest time to mature. If there are excessive periods of cool wet weather as the seed is maturing, the seed can have broken seed coats, or be sprouted in the pod. I can speculate that in your cool Maritime climate, @Decoy1 , this is far more of an issue than it is here.

 

[flowerbug]

IMO, that observation is a pretty good generalization. In my garden, the round-podded filet beans (such as Fortex and Emerite) and large-seeded beans with flat pods (such as Jembo Polish and Bird Egg #3) tend to take the longest time to mature. If there are excessive periods of cool wet weather as the seed is maturing, the seed can have broken seed coats, or be sprouted in the pod. I can speculate that in your cool Maritime climate, @Decoy1 , this is far more of an issue than it is here.

i'm not sure if it is lack of sun and too wet or too hot and not enough moisture, but with my one garden this year doing so well in comparison to the others i'm really suspecting it's just the soil is so poor the plants have insufficient nutrition to finish the larger beans as well...

some of the beans i favor right now are mainly because they finish early and are mid-sized so i get a good return usually from them no matter where i plant them, if they're a bush or semi-runner that's better as i don't have fences/poles most places.

it's also why i'm so happy when i find a new cross from any of them which holds to that pattern.

@aftermidnight, thanks for the links to the blog about the French beans, i learned some new things by reading along there. like about the pods and why some are lumpy and others not...

 

[Decoy1]

I can speculate that in your cool Maritime climate, @Decoy1 , this is far more of an issue than it is here.

@Zeedman. I live in one of the warmer drier parts of England, in fenland, over on the east side.
This has been an unusually hot dry summer with drought and high temperatures, often around 86F, throughout July. It will be interesting to see how varieties compare next year if it’s nearer normal (though not sure what normal is going to be over the next years).
580mm average rainfall and 50F average temperature. But yes, classified as cool maritime (CfB I think).
I’d be interested to know of any US area which has somewhat similar conditions. North west coastal strip?

 

[aftermidnight]

@Decoy1 I'm just above the Canada U.S. border on Vancouver Island. Your climate and mine are just about the same. On the rare occasion we hit the 90's in the summer but not often, when it does this I turn into a whining, sniveling, hide in the house pitiful mess, I admit it, no guts. Going by this graph it looks like we are just about the same and bet we could rival anyone for being the slug/snail capital of the world.
Winters here are unpredictable, some winters are very mild without a flake of snow, actually shirtsleeve weather others.... you can freeze your butt off.

Here's a graph for my area...
https://en.climate-data.org/location/972/

Annette