2022 Little Easy Bean Network - We Are Beans Without Borders

[meadow]

There is still a good amount of seed of this bean. I picked good seed from this years grow out to grow again next year. I also have two backup packets of small seed from 2022 in the freezer with 27 beans in each packet. I have a 2017 backup packet of normal sized seed and a 2018 backup packet of normal sized seed of this bean in the freezer. This years grow out of this bean really surprised me that it grew so poorly while at the same time other beans in the same plot grew very well. A soil test did show that the potassium level is low and calcium is less than optimal. So that might affect some varieties. Oraganic matter is medium which is also less than optimal. I need to ammned the soil. Will see if I can bring up the mineral levels to optimal range if that will affect growth on varieties grown in that soil.

Oh, okay. Thanks. I do have seed for this that I will be growing out (from Adaptive Seed, and they look very nice) either this year or next. So if you feel that you'd like to replenish from a new supply, just let me know.

 

[flowerbug]

There are two packets of original seed of Andkiove in the freezer, 10 seeds in each packet. You contributed Montville seed in 2020 so there are 5 packets of backup of this one, 15 seeds per packet. Shelleasy x Soldier there are 4 packets of 16 seeds each in the freezer.

ok, good to know! i have six decent quality seeds to try again with.

Striped Bunch, Whatever you have left is all there is of that one.

yikes! (no pressure!) i barely got any good looking seeds in this year's results but i have 20 seeds to try again with. i'll plant 10 next year and 10 the year after and hope one of them works out.

i thought i did see that someone else was growing Striped Bunch this year?

in looking on-line i see that Striped Bunch is available in other places so it is likely not lost if my seeds don't come through. *whew!*

 

[flowerbug]

...Fukuryu Chunaga I wonder what happened with that one I have 6 seeds left and I will grow those out myself maybe next summer. I will presprout them before planting to make sure they are alive yet.

the seeds were viable for me and they did grow but the plants produced no flowers or pods. they weren't planted late and we had a long season.

it was pretty hot and dry for a long enough spell that perhaps they just couldn't manage to flower, but i did keep them watered. the plants all looked ok to me all season and i hoped they would bloom later.

 

[Branching Out]

I don't think I mentioned that Fedco ships to Canada.

I think we have very similar growing conditions.

May keep an eye on Fedco, once they get the seed in stock. And it may be a good thing that I'm being blocked from purchasing more seeds. My husband says he is bringing home a tree this afternoon, which I think means that the racks of dried zinna heads, pails with millet stalks, and bowls of buckwheat need to vacate the living room asap. Not quite sure where I am going to put them, but I have a few hours!

 

[Blue-Jay]

I am really enjoying your Bean Show Blue Jay. And a pound of seeds from just 11 plants- wow.

Thank you I'm so glad that all the photos and information is enjoyed. I have fun putting it together.
Some of these beans are pretty productive. The bush bean champion of 2022 for me was Horsehead I was truely amazed at this one. The row section I planted was the same length as all the other beans and I got over 1.5 pounds. 27.45 ounces. Many of my beans I was able to keep all the seed on one styro picnic plate but horse head took two plates to contain all it's seed. The funny thing about the Horsehead was after growing the seed in 2014 I left it sit in larger plastic zip lock bags in my basement for about 5 years before I decided to put it away in the freezer. Took out a sample packet of that 2014 seed from the freezer in the spring to grow and I think I got a hundred per cent germination. I've also have a baby food jar of it full sitting on a shelf that has never been in the freezer since 2014. It's my inventory jars that I take seed out of to full seed orders. I don't get that many request for Horsehead but the other day somone wanted a packet and I filled that packet from that baby food jar and packed it along with the persons other beans they wanted. Then I started thinking I wonder if that 2014 seed in the jar would grow very well. This was the night before Thanksgiving I decided to take about 15 of those seeds from that jar and start a germination test with damp paper towel in a ziploc baggie. The seed has darkened a lot since 2014 and sorta looks old. The next day I was off to my neices house in the Chicago suburbs for Thanksgiving. I stayed overnight and decided to stay another day. Before I left the house I turned the heat down to 60 and I'm not sure that my thermostat keeps the tempearture correctly. I had a stand alone thermometer in the living room once and it showed two degrees below what the thermostat was set. So the temperature in the house might have been 58 in the house for two days. What a way to treat old seed. I came back home Saturday morning and turned the heat back up to 69. I didn't check the seeds until Tuesday after the holiday. When I did the growth looked really vigorous and healthy and every single seed germinated.

 

[heirloomgal]

A soil test did show that the potassium level is low and calcium is less than optimal.

You could always save your eggshells, dry them out through winter and crush them to a powder at planting time. Voila, calcium! Granulated chicken manure is also great for calcium and very easy to apply.

Fukuryu Chunaga I wonder what happened with that one I have 6 seeds left and I will grow those out myself maybe next summer.

I sent back 60 of this one if that helps. It was a very nice bean, I really liked it. The first few dried pods had beans that split open for some reason and I thought they might be very sensitive to rain, but the rest of the pods were just fine.

After reading about Horsehead I somehow now feel like I should try to grow this bean...it doesn't hurt that it's handsome as well.

 

[Blue-Jay]

You could always save your eggshells, dry them out through winter and crush them to a powder at planting time. Voila, calcium! Granulated chicken manure is also great for calcium and very easy to apply.

I have saved egg shells for the last 12 years. I've used a little of it. I could powder it in my kitchen blender.

 

[flowerbug]

I have saved egg shells for the last 12 years. I've used a little of it. I could powder it in my kitchen blender.

i use a flat ended stick to crush them in a flat bottomed container then i put them in the worm buckets so they will get out to the gardens during planting time. they're not quite powdered but close enough.

 

[meadow]

Has anyone grown King City Pinks?

(I'm wondering if they need a hotter climate than we have in the PNW)

 

[Blue-Jay]

Has anyone grown King City Pinks?

I glanced at your post and somehow the name of the bean you posted seemed like it could be sort of familiar. So I decided to do a search on my freezer inventory for just King City and up popped "King City Pink" with out the letter S on the end. Probably the same bean. I don't find this bean on my spreadsheet which would have contained some information. I have people just hand me beans at seed swaps and I'm thinking that is where I likely got this bean. All the seed swaps I have attended are east of the eastern Illinois border. I would bet the bean I got is the same as the one you post. I've got 5 samples of 12 seeds each. Want to do a grow out of this one next year?