2023 Little Easy Bean Network - Beans Beyond The Colors Of A Rainbow

[Beanmad Nanna]

Finally got some sunlight for pictures this evening. So interesting to watch the different beans grow and observe differences in their flowers and leaf types.

Network bean Dead Man's Tooth. Yup, it's a bush bean for me too @Artorius! The flowers are pure, pure white and make me think the name has as much to do with the flowers as the beans! (The runner on the left is from the other plant.)
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I think network bean Botosani Splash below may also turn out to be a bush bean. It's got good sized green beans forming and I still don't see any runners showing up.
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The buttery flowers of network bean Old Time Golden Stick (hope I got that name right).View attachment 58493



Network bean Stephano Borlotti D'Avento. Starting to really fill out. Looking forward to shelling these beauties!
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Network bean Grey Mountain.
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Network bean Kitoba. The seeds of this variety were remarkably pretty. A very unusual variety indeed.
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@Zeedman 's Sangre de Toro. The little red seeds sprouted plants that had pinkish reddish coloured stems in the early stages of growth. These went in as transplants so I'm a little surprised that they took so long to start climbing. But I did put more than 4 plants on the pole, so that may have had an effect. The growth habit is quite tidy. Looks like a few beans float around with this name attached, though they have different growth habits. View attachment 58500

Ecuador Cranberry, which went in as seeds.
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These are all network bean poles in the front row, if I remember correctly (right to left) they are Turkey #1, Hemelvaartboontje, *Sloot* (ahem), and...can't remember the last one?
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I let DD pick a bean to grow for this container - she chose Theresa's Pink Portugal. I'm surprised how big the plants have gotten for having gone in rather late as seeds.View attachment 58502

The pictures of your set-up are lovely. Practically, I wonder how the birch stands up, as I 'know' them to be brittle in my experience. More, the stands of white stems reminds me somewhat of (northern territories?) Australian traditional funary/ancestor practices in Arnhemland, (I think). Decorated tree trunks placed in a sacred site. (oooh, all poetic now - feel a piece of writing coming on ... ) Something about lineage, and honouring those before as well as recognition & tending to those present. Using birch may be merely practical for you, but it looks stunning.

 

[Beanmad Nanna]

Great info @Zeedman. I really paid attention this year to their cycles as best I could. I was trying to see where the most dicey times to plant were. I did basically three different outdoor plantings, the first and second one I lost a handful to the flies. Each bush bean row lost about one plant, though a few rows were hit harder and I replanted and covered in ashes or coffee grinds. Some had been eaten up as seeds underground, some managed to sprout but had their first leaves eaten underground. The last flush of putting in seeds - where there were holes in rows or on poles - these were the most attacked, mostly the first leaves when underground so they came up as blind sprouts.

One thing I feel 100% certain about, the fresher the seed is the less likely a bean seed fly will plant eggs on it even if it's in their peak hatching time. It is older seed that really seems to be more likely to attract them. Even my Bird Egg Blue seeds from 2019, not that old really, had some losses.

I did an experiment with the last little bean plantings in planter boxes - I covered them with a sheer horticultural fabric and that seem to protect them 100%. I got that idea from a fellow over at seed company Potager Ornamental de Catherine in Quebec, they started losing their bean crops in a huge way to the flies, I think they said nearly 80%. So they have started to do transplants and use horticultural fabric. I will definitely do that next year with the bush beans which I don't want to use transplants with.

I read about the chemical the germinating beans release that to signal to the flies, and it seems that some beans have a more potent chemical emission than others.

eta: I found the culprit for my missing soybeans, including last nights decimation of a row of Maple Glen soybeans. A bear.

btw the nearest we get to bears are maurauding teenagers &/or ... well that's it really

One thing I feel 100% certain about, the fresher the seed is the less likely a bean seed fly will plant eggs on it even if it's in their peak hatching time. It is older seed that really seems to be more likely to attract them. Even my Bird Egg Blue seeds from 2019, not that old really, had some losses.

I did an experiment with the last little bean plantings in planter boxes - I covered them with a sheer horticultural fabric and that seem to protect them 100%. I got that idea from a fellow over at seed company Potager Ornamental de Catherine in Quebec, they started losing their bean crops in a huge way to the flies, I think they said nearly 80%. So they have started to do transplants and use horticultural fabric. I will definitely do that next year with the bush beans which I don't want to use transplants with.

I read about the chemical the germinating beans release that to signal to the flies, and it seems that some beans have a more potent chemical emission than others.

this is so fascinating ( botanist brain tempted to read papers of these phytochemicals and co-evolution of this bean fly ).
loving the observation about fresh vs older seeds. v interesting.

 

[heirloomgal]

The pictures of your set-up are lovely. Practically, I wonder how the birch stands up, as I 'know' them to be brittle in my experience. More, the stands of white stems reminds me somewhat of (northern territories?) Australian traditional funary/ancestor practices in Arnhemland, (I think). Decorated tree trunks placed in a sacred site. (oooh, all poetic now - feel a piece of writing coming on ... ) Something about lineage, and honouring those before as well as recognition & tending to those present. Using birch may be merely practical for you, but it looks stunning.

Aw thank you @Beanmad Nanna! Yes, they need help to remain upright. I use a scaling bar that is an antique from the mines here, a big heavy thing. It has a wedge point on one end and I have to drive that into the ground several times using the weight of the pole to a depth of 2 feet. It takes a few minutes, probably 5 for each birch tree.

If the trees are fresh, they have a lot of elasticity and will not break and yield wonderfully to the weight of heavy pods. I've tried re-using them one year to the next and that's when they do indeed break, that's been a learning curve for me. It's quite a bit of effort and labour to cut those, drag them out, trim them, cut a point on the end and then put in the holes - so I tried to extend the time I could use them. It all has to be taken out & then put in again every year to so we can till. The bark can actually be a little slippery for the vines so I copied @Bluejay77 's technique of using "screws" along the upper length, which in my case is leaving 3 or 4 inches stubs behind after de-limbing.

 

[Beanmad Nanna]

Every year I have an internal debate with myself on the number of varieties per species to grow with the goal of preserving the chosen varieties. Given a commonly accepted recommendation of at least 10 plants per variety and 20 feet between varieties for common beans, how does one manage to preserve over 120 varieties per season? Do you bag blossoms/plants? Do you find much crossing in the next season's grow-outs? I've always planted taking the isolation distance & population size recommendations into account which then calls for careful mapping; it'd sure make it easier if it turns out 3-6 plants per variety next to each other is enough to maintain a variety's genetics season after season. Thoughts? TIA.

this bothers me too Eleanor -
How close are the spacings I can get away with?
Which plants are most likely to cross?
and can I train bumbles etc to make the crosses I dream of?

 

[Beanmad Nanna]

Aw thank you @Beanmad Nanna! Yes, they need help to remain upright. I use a scaling bar that is an antique from the mines here, a big heavy thing. It has a wedge point on one end and I have to drive that into the ground several times using the weight of the pole to a depth of 2 feet. It takes a few minutes, probably 5 for each birch tree.

If the trees are fresh, they have a lot of elasticity and will not break and yield wonderfully to the weight of heavy pods. I've tried re-using them one year to the next and that's when they do indeed break, that's been a learning curve for me. It's quite a bit of effort and labour to cut those, drag them out, trim them, cut a point on the end and then put in the holes - so I tried to extend the time I could use them. It all has to be taken out & then put in again every year to so we can till. The bark can actually be a little slippery for the vines so I copied @Bluejay77 's technique of using "screws" along the upper length, which in my case is leaving 3 or 4 inches stubs behind after de-limbing.

I tend to leave stubby bits where I trim my bean poles (sometimes quite long) .
And I also learnt the hard way on reusing hazel poles for heavy vigorous beans.
I do reuse them in various set ups, usually as horizontals where they are not going to be the only load bearing structural element.

 

[Blue-Jay]

Using birch may be merely practical for you, but it looks stunning.

I thought about the same thing the first time I saw heirloomgal's Birch poles. They are a thing of beauty when the green of those bean plants are wrapped around those white poles. Maybe I should paint all my single poles white and be a little bit of a copy cat.

 

[heirloomgal]

I thought about the same thing the first time I saw heirloomgal's Birch poles. They are a thing of beauty when the green of those bean plants are wrapped around those white poles. Maybe I should paint all my single poles white and be a little bit of a copy cat.

Oh my goodness @Bluejay77 this gave me a heck of a laugh. But hey, it would certainly preserve them!

 

[Beanmad Nanna]

I thought about the same thing the first time I saw heirloomgal's Birch poles. They are a thing of beauty when the green of those bean plants are wrapped around those white poles. Maybe I should paint all my single poles white and be a little bit of a copy cat.

When a busy person adds another job to the priorities list ...

 

[Blue-Jay]

Diamont - Pole Dry. I grew again this year. I got from a grower in Austria that I've got a few other beans from. Last year I harvested 11 ounces (311 grams). Thought I was maybe going to do better with this year but not a chance another struggling bean at 3 ounces (85 grams)

Viola Di Assiago - Pole Dry. This one I get so many requests that I send out all but what I keep for growing a new crop again. This year was better than last year 1.5 pounds (680 grams). I had a couple of winners.


Diamont - Pole Dry.............................................................................Viola Di Assiago - Pole Dry

 

[Zeedman]

You mean the taste of the peanuts? I've never had them just cured without being roasted so I'm not sure. Could be. Anyone ever eat a peanut that was not cooked in any way, just dry cured?

Nope. DW liked them boiled plain though.... kind of like over-ripe edamame now that I think about it.

An update. As I was cleaning, I found one of the "Argentinian White" peanuts that had fallen & rolled under a shelf... so it had cured for awhile. Since I had a pliers right there (this peanut was hard) I cracked it open & ate them raw. Not bad! Much crunchier than roasted or boiled. More richly flavored too; roasting may develop some flavors, while baking out others. I like raw pecans, so I guess its not surprising that raw peanuts taste good to me too.