2024 Little Easy Bean Network - Growing Heirloom Beans Of Today And Tomorrow

[Blue-Jay]

now that your collections seem to be refreshed really well you can perhaps have a list of the network beans out that were never returned or others that you have a small amount or limited supply and could use some more.

Last year after the Central Michigan Seed Swap I stopped by Karen Goldens house in Highland, Michigan and picked up a 30 pound black garbage page of beans that were orignally at Susan Simcox's house and beans the Joseph had brought back into this country from overseas. I took them home and in April did a germination test on them. I discarded 35 varieties that didn't germinate at all. Some that I already had a good supply of quality seed in my freezer I discarded because Joe Simcox had given samples of them to me back in 2014 and '15. There are a few of these beans on the Network pages that Joe had actually had the correct name of them written on his packets. A few of them he just had the country where he collected them and if they had any germination at all I named them and put them on the Network. Joseph had a lot of beans in this package where he didn't give any name or country where he collected them. So there is a bunch of them in my freezer that will grow, but are just marked No Name and a number. I could put them up in a posting if anyone would like to grow them out and name them. I would then include these on the Network pages when I get a full page worth of bean names. A full page is 56 varieties. I checked my freezer list and there are 25 beans listed as No Name that I am pretty sure came out of that bag of Simcox beans last year.

I just put up another bean on the priority list I found on my freezer list that has 90% germination that I didn't get on the Network when I added a page last year.

 

[Zeedman]

No I don't have such a list but maybe I should have. I will have to ponder on that aspect of keeping a bean collection.

Are there still Robert Lobitz beans that you are searching for?

 

[Blue-Jay]

Are there still Robert Lobitz beans that you are searching for?

When @flowerbug asked if there were any beans I would like to find I forgot about my profile on the yearbook. So I went and looked my profile up on the SSE online yearbook and found listed a bean called Black Soldier that I had back in the early 1980's. I think it is slightly larger than the Soldier bean with a black soldier figure around the eye. It's a beautiful bean and bush in growth. I still have all the left over seed stocks of the beans I grew in the 1980's and never sent out on request including named outcrosses that I had never continued to grow. I should have never stopped growing that collection. But what can I say it is what it is now.

Lobitz beans I'm looking for 1.) Crow River Speckles 2.) Kelly Lake - I had bought this one from a place in Australia but upon grow out I didn't get back a single seed that looked like the original they sent to me. Every seed must have been from a cross. Other Lobitz beans I would like to find 3.) Little Baby Pinto 4.) Little Cloud Leopard 5.) Purple Glory 6.) Spring Valley Pinto 7.) Queen Bee. If these could be found I would have all his original named beans. Several years ago when the seed seed curator of SSE at the time had sent me 23 Lobitz beans that I didn't have at that time. I had mentioned these bean names but he couldn't find them in their database.

Now all the Robert Lobitz beans I refer to as his Legacy beans that I write about or list on my website. Robert never saw these beans and I have named them. I have started out with Robert's raw number coded seed stock. Small samples somtimes only 3 seeds. Actually these beans are probably more my orignals now as he had likely never grown them beyond just the orignal crossed stock. When it comes to his number codes he gave to his orignal crossed material. I have no idea how to interpret the meaning of those number codes. There is one of his original beans that he never gave a proper name to. I have a complete print out of Robert's beans that were in his collection and his orignal named beans. I can see the number codes similar to this one orignal bean he never named but was trying to develop other beans that contained part of this code but was not exactly the same. The bean he never named is PXBT-PP-97B-OOH.

Someday I hope someone will collect all my original named beans. Some are pretty and some are not so interesting looking but good beans and useful. Some of these names were not so imaginative at the time I named them. These days I work my brain harder to come up with better sounding or interesting names.

 

[ducks4you]

It is the 3RD of January and your are ALREADY speaking GREEK!!!!
Actually, this is one of my favorite threads.

 

[flowerbug]

Last year after the Central Michigan Seed Swap I stopped by Karen Goldens house in Highland, Michigan and picked up a 30 pound black garbage page of beans that were orignally at Susan Simcox's house and beans the Joseph had brought back into this country from overseas.

*whimper*

i'm so glad you were able to rescue them!

I took them home and in April did a germination test on them. I discarded 35 varieties that didn't germinate at all.

Some that I already had a good supply of quality seed in my freezer I discarded because Joe Simcox had given samples of them to me back in 2014 and '15. There are a few of these beans on the Network pages that Joe had actually had the correct name of them written on his packets. A few of them he just had the country where he collected them and if they had any germination at all I named them and put them on the Network.

Joseph had a lot of beans in this package where he didn't give any name or country where he collected them. So there is a bunch of them in my freezer that will grow, but are just marked No Name and a number. I could put them up in a posting if anyone would like to grow them out and name them. I would then include these on the Network pages when I get a full page worth of bean names. A full page is 56 varieties. I checked my freezer list and there are 25 beans listed as No Name that I am pretty sure came out of that bag of Simcox beans last year.

i think it would be useful to mention that on the packet that they came via JS... even if he didn't know where he collected them at least we would know how they got to where you picked them up.

I just put up another bean on the priority list I found on my freezer list that has 90% germination that I didn't get on the Network when I added a page last year.

my answer is always that i would like to grow every bean i could get my hands on, plus do a full genetic analysis of each of them and have a few square miles and plenty of minions to do everything i want to get done... reality is that i can probably keep growing 20-50 beans a year in my few thousand square feet gardens, but that also includes my bulk bean growing for eating.

 

[Zeedman]

Last year after the Central Michigan Seed Swap I stopped by Karen Goldens house in Highland, Michigan and picked up a 30 pound black garbage page of beans that were orignally at Susan Simcox's house and beans the Joseph had brought back into this country from overseas.

That sounds like gold ore to me.

 

[heirloomgal]

Your Network package has not gone out yet. I'm waiting for Decoy 1's package so I can fill your request for Fat Man. I can also include Blue Spitball and you can return it in your brown paper wrapped Used Cassette Tapes package.

I also saw a comment on the 2023 thread about you wanting to grow Draper's Glen. Do you want to try that one too this year. It is still very unstable. I could send it too.

WAHOO SPITBALL!

Draper's Glen.....oooh, that's very tempting. I love that bean, and the name.....thinking thinking thinking.....I should probably hold off on that one for now @Bluejay77. Much as I'd like to grow it I think all my slots are pretty well full for this year. I've even dropped a few other crops I usually grow to be able to fit in even more beans I've acquired. I think I'm not quite ready to take on the fun project of new beans to be stabilized yet. I definitely want to do that someday, but I'm not quite there yet so, thank you, but I'll just add on Blue Spitball for now. So excited!!!!

 

[heirloomgal]

It is the 3RD of January and your are ALREADY speaking GREEK!!!!
Actually, this is one of my favorite threads.

@ducks4you

 

[flowerbug]

That sounds like gold ore to me.

i-know-rite!!!!!

(this next bit is complete aside so skip it if you don't want to read about gold refining videos on youtube)...

there's a youtube channel called sreetips where he does various versions of gold refining and sometimes at night when i need a visual thing to get my brain to stop analyzing so i will bring up one of his videos. note, i do not own gold or keep any here at the house and i have zero plans to ever do this sort of thing, but for some reason the combination of colors and process often works for what i need it to do.

and then to get back to the bean topic, yes, i could go look at bean pictures too...

 

[Artorius]

When @flowerbug asked if there were any beans I would like to find I forgot about my profile on the yearbook. So I went and looked my profile up on the SSE online yearbook and found listed a bean called Black Soldier that I had back in the early 1980's. I think it is slightly larger than the Soldier bean with a black soldier figure around the eye. It's a beautiful bean and bush in growth. I still have all the left over seed stocks of the beans I grew in the 1980's and never sent out on request including named outcrosses that I had never continued to grow. I should have never stopped growing that collection. But what can I say it is what it is now.

@Bluejay77
Is Black Soldier one of Ernest B. Dana beans? It's on the list you made for me once. If so, will it ever be in your commercial or network catalog?