Cool beans!

[Hermitian]

What are you folks going to grow in 2014?

I'm going to plant

Jumbo Bush Bean
Windsor Fava Bean
Tongue Of Fire Shell Bean
Fordhook Lima Bean

and maybe some others if you have tantalizing suggestions!

[Pappi]

This year I'm doing

Windsor Fava
Dragon Tongue Bush
Soleil Bush
Velour Bush

[habitat_gardener]

I've been growing a couple dozen varieties a year, and probably will continue to do so. I lean toward snap pole beans, but I grow a little of everything. Here's what's on the list so far.

Blue Coco -- has done very well since I started growing it a couple years ago, great as a raw snap bean
La Vigneronne -- one of my favorites as a raw snap
Sultan's Green Crescent -- one of my favorite cooked snap beans
Scarlet Runner Beans -- has returned from the root the past couple years!
Flamingo -- hoping to try
Fortex -- if I can find some
Grandma Nellie's Yellow Mushroom -- ditto
one or more varieties of Romano pole beans

[Labradors2]

Purple Peacock pole bean (wildly productive and tasty)
Blue Lake bush (also productive and tasty)
Some varieties from the seed swap - can't wait to see what I get!

Linda

[Geezer]

I'm planning on using Hutterite Soup and Chinese Yardlong in a 3 sisters setup.

My "old standbys" for bush green beans are:
tenderette
top crop
Roma II
contender

I'll also put in a row of royal burgandy if there is room.


Evil Ed

[Sun City Linda]

For runners, Fortex for sure, possibly Jiminez, and Rattlesnake. For Bush, Maxibel and probably some Jade, Dragon Tongue and Black Valentine also. Oh and a runner, Insuk's Wang Kong. Or, who knows?

[Hermitian]

Originally Posted by Sun City Linda

For runners, Fortex for sure, possibly Jiminez, and Rattlesnake. For Bush, Maxibel and probably some Jade, Dragon Tongue and Black Valentine also. Oh and a runner, Insuk's Wang Kong. Or, who knows?

Rattlesnake is one of my favorite pole beans.

[Patihum]

Rattlesnake -first year for this one.
Contender - always reliable here.
Christmas Lima - first year for this one too.
Henderson's Bush Lima - did super last year.

[Tormato]

~200 varieties, and I'm not in any mood to make a list, yet.

[habitat_gardener]

Originally Posted by Tormato

~200 varieties, and I'm not in any mood to make a list, yet.

Not in a list-making mood! Can't imagine why...unless it's the billions and billions of lists of tomato varieties you're dealing with!

[KarenO]

what! 200 varieties? you will have to start a new site called beanville. Jiminy Crickets that's a lot of beans
Karen

[tnpeppers]

Beans are very good for you.

[luigiwu]

I planted Dragon Tongue Bush beans late in the summer and it did not do well. Granted, it was not in the sunniest spot, the beans had a very thick skin to them and hardly gave me any pods(at most a HANDFUL?? even though I had 2 bushes/plants.)
As I'm planning out my 2014 garden, gun-shy about beans is putting it mildly. I am currently only considering red yard-long asian beans.

[feldon30]

Originally Posted by luigiwu

I planted Dragon Tongue Bush beans late in the summer and it did not do well. Granted, it was not in the sunniest spot, the beans had a very thick skin to them and hardly gave me any pods(at most a HANDFUL?? even though I had 2 bushes/plants.)

2 bushes/plants is a very small quantity. I would expect to get about 30-40 pods max out of 2 plants. You can pack 15 plants into a 4 foot row that's about 15 inches wide and that would give a nice crop. I personally grow a 4x4 area and am inundated with beans. Also, don't forget to inoculate your beans with rhizomia (?). Otherwise they take off very slowly.

Very strange to hear the results re: tough beans. Maybe a bad batch of crossed seed? I picked mine when the beans just started to fill out and the pods were about 7 inches long. If you wait until the beans completely fill out, then Dragon Tongue is a shelling bean.


I'm growing only Dragon Tongue this year.



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[Labradors2]

Hey Luigiwu,

Give them another chance! I too had a horrible yield from my Rattlesnake and Scarlet Runners, but it simply wasn't fair to plant them in a (large) pot, far away from a water source and expect them to grow on a shady arbour with no supplemental watering. The Scarlet Runners didn't do much better the following year when I thought it would be fun to grow them up a large Honey Locust tree as they still didn't get enough light or water.

Last year I planted Purple Peacock because a friend gave them to me and told me that she couldn't keep up with their production. I planted a dozen plants in my veggie garden and lost a couple. They were amazing, grown in full sun with adequate water!

I do think that you might be expecting too much by only planting two bean plants. IMHO you probably need more than two plants to be able to pick a meal's worth for two people whenever you feel like it (or maybe I'm just a little piggy when it comes to eating beans!)

Linda