2019 Little Easy Bean Network - Come And Reawaken The Thrill Of Discovery

[Blue-Jay]

Russ Crow's 2019 Bean Show Day #5​

Champagne - Pole Green Snap,

Seed of this bean was given to John Raymond Hepler plant breeder and horticultural professor at the University of New Hampshire by Ernie Champagne in the 1940's. J.R.'s son Billy who started the Hepler Seed Co. at the age of 12 carried this bean in his catalog in 1952. The bean has long up to 9 inch pods. The bean did quite well this year. I harvested a total of 13.30 ounces ( 377 grams) of white seed from a planting of 8 seeds although I don't know if all 8 seeds grew. I may of had 5 or 6 plants.

Champagne - Pole Green Snap,

 

[Blue-Jay]

Russ Crow's 2019 Bean Show Day #5​

Cherokee Bean - Semi Runner,

I had purchased this bean browsing the internet in late 2011 from something called Urban Harvest in Houston, Texas. I don't what their purpose was but they were closing out their seed library so I bought this bean. It has fairly large seeds. A red horticultrual or cranberry type. It unexpectedly produced about half it's crop in an off type which was dark purplish blue. It usually a fairly productive bean but I had it growing too close to a zinnia planting this year and it didn't produce as much. 6 ounces total seed harvest (170 grams) from 15 seeds planted in the middle of June. First photo is Cherokee Bean and second photo is it's off type.

Cherokee Bean - Semi Runner Dry,

Cherokee Bean Off Type 2019 - Semi Runner Dry,

 

[Blue-Jay]

Russ Crow's 2019 Bean Show Day #5​

Clay Bank Fall - Pole, Snap, Shell, Dry,

This bean didn't do so well in the enviorment I had this year. Lots of shriveled seed. Harvested 7.20 ounces (204 grams). I will pick and save some of the best seeds and perhaps plant them in some future year.

Clay Bank Fall - Pole

 

[reedy]

I love all those off-types and their segragations. I remember years ago when I first read Susan Ashworth's "Seed to Seed" I got so discouraged about seed saving with all the rules on purity, isolation and inbreeding. My gardens just aren't that big so for awhile I thought I couldn't really save my own seeds but that's not true at all.

With beans especially witch happens to be one of my favorite things to grow you can just ignore most of that. They don't cross all that easily so a nice heirloom is easy to keep, just plant by it itself on the other side of the corn or something and separate out any off-types that do show up before planting the next year.

Turns out those off-types area wonderful bonus, not at all something to be discarded. Seeing what they turn into is more fun than Christmas. "Seed to Seed" now, is one of the most treasured books in my library, I'm always consulting it for something or another.

 

[flowerbug]

@reedy for those who are trying to preserve existing varieties it can be tough to keep all the off types from ruining your efforts, especially if you only have a few seeds to work with.

i have been at the other end of this where i like to mingle certain beans and plant rows of one kind next to others that i'm trying to encourage crosses to happen.

i don't find it difficult to get new crosses. each year i find new ones showing up. some of them are turning out to be well worth it as they are more acclimated to our soil and fungi.

 

[reedy]

Oh, I very much encourage crossing in my mixed beans and get crosses all the time. I don't much keep track of them in the mixed patch, just make sure any obvious new ones get planted the next year. I'v noticed the bees are not random, they don't fly around willy nilly but very methodically visit one flower then the one next to it. So, In my mix patches I make sure to plant different types beside each other in the row.

Still I like to keep any that stand out to me, as pure varieties. Ones like KY Wonder, the new Refugee and so on. These go in their own rows and often separated by something else. Off types are less common that way but they are also the ones I pursue to stabilize as new types. I'v never had much problem keeping a variety pure, if that is what is desired. For my production patches I often grow 25 to 50 foot rows of a pure or mixed variety. I don't always grow all kinds every year but try not to let seed archive of my favorites go below a full pint.

Other crops can be very different, corn for example. With it I purposely cross those that have traits I like and then select from the offspring. Sometimes I even detassel and hand pollinate. I love breeding new kinds of corn and at the same time eliminating genetic depression even though i grow fairly small patches.

 

[Blue-Jay]

I will not have a 2019 Bean show until I can recover or retake all my 2019 harvest bean seeds. Today I was making entries to my 2020 SSE yearbook listings and had my flash drive plugged into my computer as I was uploading photos for new listings. The electricity flashed off then on just for a second and when I got back to my 2019 harvested beans photo file all the photos were gone.

 

[Decoy1]

The bean that I have seen called Rose is more like Ohio Pole. Penland Family has been grown around the Knoxville, Tennessee area as far back as the 1860's and probably even much earlier. I've never tried Penland as a snap bean yet.

Penland Family refused to thrive for me this year. The foliage growth was very fine and delicate but it didn’t climb and didn’t produce anything except a couple of small flowers. I wonder whether it needs rather warm conditions to prosper?

 

[Decoy1]

Russ Crow's 2019 Bean Show Day #4​

Brejo - Pole, Snap

Indigenous bean. I don't know which American Indian tribe grew these. The bean was late and struggled this year. Total seed harvest was 3.75 ounces (105 grams) The bean naturally produces seeds that are somewhat flattened and curved or bent to one side.

View attachment 33480
Brejo - Pole, Snap

I also grew Brejo this season for the Heritage Seed Library in UK. My seed also was just as you describe, flattish and tending to be curved. I was also given seed named as Merveille de Piemonte. I was interested that hey seemed to me to be just the same as the Brejo, both in the seeds and the pods which were speckled and flattish too. The photo is the seed I was given. This year’s seeds are lighter but I haven’t photographed them yet.

 

[Artorius]

These are the largest and smallest varieties that I have grown this year. On the left: Piękny Jaś z Doliny Dunajca strain (...from Dunajec River Valley). On the right: Teaching Drum # 18. And Jacob's Cattle to catch the scale.