2021 Little Easy Bean Network - Bean Lovers Come Discover Something New !

[Blue-Jay]

aw @Bluejay77 are you going to reseed? it would be a shame to waste all that nice space and good soil. some may have enough time to finish.

I don't think I'm going to reseed the pole beans but I might reseed the semi runners.

 

[Ridgerunner]

If it were me I'd replant, but I have a totally different climate than you do. I think you are mostly looking to refresh seeds, not planting for production. It doesn't take that much success to get enough to refresh. Hopefully you will get enough production to eat from other beans. But I would not risk it if I only had a few of that variety.

 

[heirloomgal]

So sorry to hear about the pole bean situation @Bluejay77 Maybe you could do a quick look over at the pole bean varieties you have that are known for quick maturity like Skunk, Rattlesnake etc. Canada Wild Goose is a semi that is really fast to grow and give seed, Ga Ga Hut pinto too I think.. bet you could get those to mature in time. I remember seeing many in your window that had descriptions with remarkably early dates to maturity? Such beautiful garden space to go unused for the season...on the converse side, your gardens with the bean sprouts look amazing!

 

[Blue-Jay]

So sorry to hear about the pole bean situation @Bluejay77 Maybe you could do a quick look over at the pole bean varieties you have that are known for quick maturity like Skunk, Rattlesnake etc. Canada Wild Goose is a semi that is really fast to grow and give seed, Ga Ga Hut pinto too I think.. bet you could get those to mature in time. I remember seeing many in your window that had descriptions with remarkably early dates to maturity? Such beautiful garden space to go unused for the season...on the converse side, your gardens with the bean sprouts look amazing!

I really don't think I'm going to replant any pole beans. It's done for this season. Just try to keep what came up going. The bush beans in the raised beds didn't surprise me actually. The reason for the raised beds in that area was because the soil there says wet for prolonged periods of time. Some of the farm fields in the area sometimes don't get planted for too wet to even work. When I got the roto-tiller up in that raised bed to work the ground there was good moisture and it broke up very fine. There is even a half acre pond about 200 feet away from my raised bed gardens.

 

[baymule]

So sorry about your beans @Bluejay77 . We have had way too much rain and you haven’t had enough. The good news on the bush bean garden is outstanding.

 

[Zeedman]

Get the bad news out of the way first. Yesterday 6/12/21 went scratching around the big pole bean planting on Pheasant Lane and discovered that most of the seed will not be coming up. I couldn't find hardly any of it. It definitely appears to have rotted away in the hot dry soil. I watered fairly frequently too. Plus all the seed was pre-sprouted. The only thing I can think of is that the soil was so extremely dry. Our hot days between waterings must have killed off the sprouted seed almost immediately and then rotted away with the introduction of enough water.

@Bluejay77 , I think whatever killed your pole beans hit me too... but only for the very last batch planted. That was the hottest stretch of days; the soil was uncomfortably warm to the touch, almost like hot pavement. It was a challenge to keep the soil moist, I was watering every other day. The last 3 pole beans have really poor germination (only 2 plants for Brita's Foot Long) and digging in the row, there is no sign of seed. Three of the soybeans - which passed germination testing in April - are complete no shows.

Fortunately, the situation is not yet hopeless. My cutoff date for pole bean seed renewal is June 15th, after which there are still 100-105 days left in my growing season - usually enough time for at least partial success. There should still be enough time to re-plant the two worst pole beans, and the few survivors from the original planting would at least replenish my seed regardless. I'll start the replacements as transplants to ensure a good stand. I should have already had enough backup transplants on hand to get a decent crop, which has been my normal procedure for seed renewals. But after interpreting the long-term forecast as favorable, I chose to skip the backups this year. Which just goes to show me - AGAIN - not to change a system that works.

Two of the three missing soybeans are early enough to be re-planted also, and would most likely mature. The third soybean is a fairly late variety, which would be "iffy" - but with plenty of seed, there's nothing lost by trying.

 

[flowerbug]

i've been watering the seedlings at least twice a day. not a lot but enough to make sure the soil has remained moist. when planting some of the garden soils have been powdery and hot as mentioned so after i got the seeds in the rows and the soil firmed then i made sure to get them completely watered in. the past three days we've had rains so i've been spared the chore of watering so that has been really nice. it was raining here a few minutes ago and a good soaker so everything i've planted has just been watered again.

 

[Blue-Jay]

@Bluejay77 , I think whatever killed your pole beans hit me too... but only for the very last batch planted. That was the hottest stretch of days; the soil was uncomfortably warm to the touch, almost like hot pavement. It was a challenge to keep the soil moist, I was watering every other day. The last 3 pole beans have really poor germination (only 2 plants for Brita's Foot Long) and digging in the row, there is no sign of seed. Three of the soybeans - which passed germination testing in April - are complete no shows.

I think it was just extreme dryness of soil this spring and the intense heat. We never got our usual very April and May rains. The north side of town where I live and where my pole bean offsite is is very well drained soil to start with. I pre-sprouted all the pole beans and got 85 to 95 percent germination on everything.

I also pre-sprouted all the Lobitz beans that I have planted in my backyard bean plot, but the soil moisture was already higher there anyway.

I might try planting the semi runners that didn't come up and since you think June 15 is a reasonable cutoff for pole beans I might try replanting those that I have plenty of seed. That planting would likely have to be today.

 

[heirloomgal]

@Bluejay77 , I think whatever killed your pole beans hit me too... but only for the very last batch planted. That was the hottest stretch of days; the soil was uncomfortably warm to the touch, almost like hot pavement. It was a challenge to keep the soil moist, I was watering every other day. The last 3 pole beans have really poor germination (only 2 plants for Brita's Foot Long) and digging in the row, there is no sign of seed. Three of the soybeans - which passed germination testing in April - are complete no shows.

Fortunately, the situation is not yet hopeless. My cutoff date for pole bean seed renewal is June 15th, after which there are still 100-105 days left in my growing season - usually enough time for at least partial success. There should still be enough time to re-plant the two worst pole beans, and the few survivors from the original planting would at least replenish my seed regardless. I'll start the replacements as transplants to ensure a good stand. I should have already had enough backup transplants on hand to get a decent crop, which has been my normal procedure for seed renewals. But after interpreting the long-term forecast as favorable, I chose to skip the backups this year. Which just goes to show me - AGAIN - not to change a system that works.

Two of the three missing soybeans are early enough to be re-planted also, and would most likely mature. The third soybean is a fairly late variety, which would be "iffy" - but with plenty of seed, there's nothing lost by trying.

I'm so glad you posted this. One of my gardens was partly dedicated to soybeans, about 1/3 of it. I planted Gaia, Chiba, Grand Forks, Black Jet, Hokkaido Black & Sayamusume. I have watched in near horror this past week to see the shortage of sprouts appearing. Some of this seed was from last year, so very fresh. I just couldn't believe it and had no idea what to attribute it to. I haven't a single sprout for 3 of them. It's discouraging.
I feel a wee bit better knowing that this may in fact be tied to the weather, and not some kind of soy malediction. I planted only exactly what I would grow, and didn't double up, 'cause I didn't trust that I'd be able to tear out the extras. Big mistake to have done it that way this year. Well, on the bright side, the few that do come up will have a fast maturity with all that space to themselves.

 

[Zeedman]

I'm so glad you posted this. One of my gardens was partly dedicated to soybeans, about 1/3 of it. I planted Gaia, Chiba, Grand Forks, Black Jet, Hokkaido Black & Sayamusume. I have watched in near horror this past week to see the shortage of sprouts appearing. Some of this seed was from last year, so very fresh. I just couldn't believe it and had no idea what to attribute it to. I haven't a single sprout for 3 of them. It's discouraging.
I feel a wee bit better knowing that this may in fact be tied to the weather, and not some kind of soy malediction. I planted only exactly what I would grow, and didn't double up, 'cause I didn't trust that I'd be able to tear out the extras. Big mistake to have done it that way this year. Well, on the bright side, the few that do come up will have a fast maturity with all that space to themselves.

Ironically, Hokkaido Black was one of those affected for me as well. Only 4 sprouts out of a 15-foot row (which is at least better than the three completely dead plantings). That is especially surprising given that I over-sow heavily, and usually need to thin quite a few. T-239, a 2012 soybean which had poorer germination test results than Hokkaido Black, still needed to be thinned by 1/2.

Today I dug in all of the soybean rows affected, and found only rotten seed - no sprouting at all. That in itself is odd, because with older seed, I expect to see staggered germination over at least a 10-14 day period. That was the case for the 2012 rescue soybeans started in pots this year, some emerging as much as 3 weeks after the first sprouts... and when I dumped out the empty pots, there were still some living seeds which had not yet emerged. That there was no sign of life at all in the empty rows seems to indicate that the seed was completely destroyed after planting (probably by high soil temperatures).

One of the things which frustrates me is that two of the varieties (Hokkaido Black and Saint Ita) are not in the USDA soybean database, so I was looking forward to measuring & recording their characteristics. Both are also old & nearly dead, so I will attempt to plant Saint Ita again & hope for the best. The other two varieties, Sapporo Midori (which was supposed to be the main edamame crop) and Pando, have short DTM's; so provided that the second planting germinates, I should be able to get some seed. The weather has cooled into the upper 70's this week, so I'm cautiously optimistic.