2022 Little Easy Bean Network - We Are Beans Without Borders

[heirloomgal]

I decided last year that I'm moving away from bush beans because they are just too prone to mould for me given we always seem to get rains during dry down. I have only one isolated bed dedicated for bush beans now, with decent air flow, and this arrangement actually seems to be working! ZERO mould in the bed this year, which means I also got the spacing right - finally. I'm amazed how clean the pods are.

I thought this was interesting, how purple the Tremonti D.T. pods are even completely dry. They are the opposite of most antho veggies, these will actually bleach out to beige in direct sun. Pods were under the upper canopy.

This is my second or third grow out for Forelle Fleiderfaben, and it reminds me of something I'd forgotten - there always seems to be these 2 seed colours that show up even though I only plant the purpliest (made that word up) seed.

Here are the two crosses that showed up this year in Forelle F. (unless #1 is a reversal)

Harvested most of a new to me bean, though I still can't tell the growth habit. Most of it seemed to be on the ground. Frijol de Cerocahui, a cute little thing! If there is such a colour as pastel brown, this is it.

I got Jembo Polish to set seed! It's a giant beast! Still some pods drying on the vine, can't wait to see how much I get from 3 plants.

Irish Conners produced so early that it went in for round 2, despite defoliating significantly. I think this is an indication it would be a good, long season, green bean producer.

This is NOT a good representation, it looks way too burgundy, and I will try again another time for a photo, but this is one of the pretty purples I got from Ugandan Bantu.

 

[Zeedman]

Do your beans do okay being frozen so soon after harvesting? I should have kept the stragglers separate because the earlier beans are dry enough to shatter but I don't think that is the case for the recently dry ones.

I wonder if you could suffocate the weevils, without freezing? Presumably they need oxygen; maybe suspending dry ice in a jar to fill it with CO2, then sealing the jar, would kill the larvae as soon as they hatch. The CO2, being heavier than air, should force most of the air out of the top. Alternatively, you could generate the CO2 in a different container, and run it through a hose, to avoid any chance of freezing the seeds. Those vacuum sealing kits for jars might work, if the hose were used to pump in the CO2.

 

[meadow]

I wonder if you could suffocate the weevils, without freezing? Presumably they need oxygen; maybe suspending dry ice in a jar to fill it with CO2, then sealing the jar, would kill the larvae as soon as they hatch. The CO2, being heavier than air, should force most of the air out of the top. Alternatively, you could generate the CO2 in a different container, and run it through a hose, to avoid any chance of freezing the seeds. Those vacuum sealing kits for jars might work, if the hose were used to pump in the CO2.

That sounds like it would work. It seems a bit overwhelming atm, but I'll keep it in mind for the future. Thanks!

 

[flowerbug]

Millers I can deal with. It's those "crazy cockroaches" each summer that drive me batty, since I have no idea WHERE THEY ARE COMING FROM (if they actually LIVED in the house, either we or the Terminix guy would have noticed more of them by now, but neither of us have). They're about a third of the size of a regular Oriental Cockroach, fly EXTREMELY readily (I am aware normal cockroaches can fly, but these fly everywhere, they NEVER scuttle or run) and are ATTRACTED to light (it's been a while since I saw one now, but I think they also don't have the two little "whisker" things on the end of the abdomen regular cockroaches have.) Oh and I once saw one hiding out in the door well of the car, so they are definitely coming from outside the house.

brought in from the grocery store?

 

[flowerbug]

I wonder if you could suffocate the weevils, without freezing? Presumably they need oxygen; maybe suspending dry ice in a jar to fill it with CO2, then sealing the jar, would kill the larvae as soon as they hatch. The CO2, being heavier than air, should force most of the air out of the top. Alternatively, you could generate the CO2 in a different container, and run it through a hose, to avoid any chance of freezing the seeds. Those vacuum sealing kits for jars might work, if the hose were used to pump in the CO2.

vinegar and baking soda and you won't need dry ice or the cold.

 

[flowerbug]

Hmm this is interesting. For once I wish I had bean weevils this year so I could experiment!

hahaha!

 

[Pulsegleaner]

brought in from the grocery store?

That DID actually happen once with a regular cockroach (well, sort of regular, it was unusually short and wide, almost circular). But it's pretty clear these are coming in through the windows from outside the house. I'd just like to know where outside they are coming from.

 

[Zeedman]

vinegar and baking soda and you won't need dry ice or the cold.

Agreed, an easier way to produce CO2. The reason I chose dry ice is that it would produce dry CO2... and ordinarily, you wouldn't want to intentionally expose seeds to humidity. Upon reflection though, given that the goal is to kill weevils in seeds whose moisture levels are already too high to freeze safely, wet generation of CO2 may not be an issue.

 

[Zeedman]

I want to hear about your lablabs. Do you eat them? We often grow them as an ornamental but I've never even eaten the shoots

I've eaten the young pods while they were still flat - in "snow pea" stage. Some were fairly tasteless; but one purple-podded variety was more succulent, and when steamed, tasted much like green beans. That was a pole variety (I have no record of the name or source) and only formed pods in September, so not worth growing here... but in a hot tropical climate, hyacinth beans could be a good alternative to snap beans.

The 3-variety trial I tried was in 2005, and I haven't tried any pole lablabs since. Most pole hyacinth beans are photo-period sensitive, so won't flower until day length approaches 12 hours... which for those of us in the higher latitudes, is mid-September. There are a couple white-flowered bush varieties developed in India that are day neutral, the one I grew last year flowered in 30 days - in mid-July. There are a few other allegedly day-neutral varieties which I have seed for, but have yet to trial... unfortunately, they were among this year's cancellations.

 

[Pulsegleaner]

A big part of the problem, as I alluded to, is that we are only really able to access about half of the gene pool. There just aren't any SOURCES for African lablabs, just Asian ones. And having half the possible varieties unavailable really narrows down the potential (I'd ask the seller in Ghana, but he seems to get REALLY angry whenever I ask about looking into getting anything that he hasn't already decided to carry on his own. You should have seen what he said to me when I just asked if one could make bissap out of green roselle hibiscus.)