What's wrong with these bush beans?

VitaVeggieMan · June 3, 2011

Hi folks. This is my first year growing beans. I have 16 plants in one EarthBox, planted per EB instructions. The plants most affected are Bush Blue Lake beans that I bought as seedlings at Home De_pot (Bonnie plants), but it also affected the Purple Queen snap beans that I started from seed (picture 3). I cut off the affected leaves, but other leaves are showing the same signs. The Blue Lakes plants have small 2-3" beans on them now, so they may not be a total loss. The Purple Queen beans have flowers, but no beans yet. The Dragon Tongue beans in the same container have no flowers, and aren't looking great either.

Does anybody know what this might be? Any suggestions on how to stop or slow down the damage?

kath · June 3, 2011

Once it's warm and the plants are a good size, it seems that if you just keep picking off the bad leaves (don't do this when the plants are wet), the plant keeps growing, beans form, no problem.

I don't know the specific names of the diseases you show, but my plants have definitely had what you show in pictures 1 and 3, and picking the leaves off when I first noticed a problem works for me. I think one of them is CBMV.

Some varieties of beans have better resistance to common bean diseases than others. I've found Provider bush beans to be quite resistant to most things that plague beans in this area. I don't spray beans for disease so I can't help in that department either.

Hope someone more knowledgeable will see your thread.

June 3, 2011	#2
kath Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Jan 2010 Location: zone 6b, PA Posts: 5,664	Once it's warm and the plants are a good size, it seems that if you just keep picking off the bad leaves (don't do this when the plants are wet), the plant keeps growing, beans form, no problem. I don't know the specific names of the diseases you show, but my plants have definitely had what you show in pictures 1 and 3, and picking the leaves off when I first noticed a problem works for me. I think one of them is CBMV. Some varieties of beans have better resistance to common bean diseases than others. I've found Provider bush beans to be quite resistant to most things that plague beans in this area. I don't spray beans for disease so I can't help in that department either. Hope someone more knowledgeable will see your thread.