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

[ruralmamma]

Black Coat runner beans! I've always wanted to grow those! I have seed for them, but they're in a rotation plan because of cross pollination. Are the flowers all bright red?

More of an orange red but really beautiful as they started blooming as the cutshorts were finished. I started some other varieties but rabbits kept them mowed down.

 

[heirloomgal]

Took some more pictures today. Beautiful sunshine-y day!

'Wildtäler'. A somewhat later maturing bean for me this year, but very nice seeds. Quite difficult to get a photo of these dark seeds though. It's similar to Astrid, except that Astrid has smaller beans. Excellent production. I think the name means 'Wild Valleys'.

'Syrian Fire'. Such an incredible bush bean. After this year, one of my faves.

And a bit darker background. Makes them look a wee bit different.

'Muni Chocame'. This is the write up I found for it:

AKA Ochoriwame from the central southern Sierra Tarahumara. Distinctive Jewel like bluish-purple-gunmetal gray mottled bean. Selected from original seeds provided to us from Joseph Lofthouse after his decades of growing and thus further adapting this bean to a short season. Beautiful beans on strong vines!

There seems to be about 3 color tones in the mix, and one of them has no stripes.

'Veitch Wonder'. I saw after taking these that there is somewhat of an unusual seed variant in there. I don't think it's an entire plant, just a few pods that made different seeds because there aren't many of them. Just love this bean!

'Zimbabwe Stones'. The pods were both purple and green, which explains the slightly different colored seed. These
remind me of 'Mrociumiere' except that ZS are considerably smaller seeds.

 

[flowerbug]

always fun to see what everyone is growing!

 

[flowerbug]

...I'll be planting garlic and mulching the beds as I can but I neglected a sprain for far too long and am facing a bit of down time soon.

oh that is a hard spot to be in when the weather is nice and there is so much yet to do outside. i hope you will find ways to still get things done and also not keep injuring it. you really don't want it to be a chronic issue later in life.

Luckily I have lots of pretty bean seed to sort and keep me occupied.

 

[Dahlia]

To everyone using spreadsheets, do you keep a physical copy of your inventory for backup?

I've lost too many garden notes do to electronic failures and my own failure to periodically transfer those notes to a journal. I'm currently growing 48 pepper plants as a trial and keeping note of characteristics of each. I observe them first thing in the morning and sometimes I just take my physical records outside and take notes.

It is super smart to keep both digital and paper records! It's easy to mess up data or lose it on a computer if you don't do regular backups. On the other hand I have had boxes kept in storage get the contents damaged by water too. The odds of both copies getting ruined are low indeed!