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Old November 13, 2017   #3033
Zone9b
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Join Date: Jul 2014
Location: Central Florida
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Picked beans on Sunday. Both Pike and Boone varieties were quite productive. This is the best fall bean season that I have had in a long time. Fall is often challenging for snap beans here in Central Florida. At least for me. Rust can be an issue. Boone but not Pike is resistant to rust, but I didn’t have a problem with rust this fall. Pike is said to produce a concentrated set and that is my experience. Two good picks and that is about it, however, this can be an advantage of continuous set if you want to use your bed for something else, like Broccoli. Boone was a complete surprise. Given that it is said to be continuous set, I assumed that 1st pick would be small as it usually is with a continuous set variety. To my surprise Boone’s first pick was even better than Pike, in fact the best first pick I have seen from any bean variety.
I’m not sure what this means. Will Boone turn out to be a concentrated set variety or will it produce ,as a continuous set variety, several large picks. Time will tell.

I have often thought that one of the reasons that my fall snap season is in general worse than my spring season is the fact that it is said that nematodes are a bigger problem in the fall then in the spring. However, I am somewhat unsure of this. Look at my second picture, which is of roots from one of the Pike bean plants I pulled. Would you believe that this plant was actually loaded with beans which were of acceptable size. The nematodes are certainly there in the bed but don’t seem to have actually hugely affected the production of beans. If I had a tomato plant with nematode activity like this I would be very lucky to get a single tomato from the plant.
Speaking of tomato plants and nematodes, the third picture is of a Brandywine Cherry Dark OP (BCD) tomato plant. It is hard to see in the picture but the BCD plant has a lot of tomatoes on it. BCD appears to be quite resistant to nematodes. Tomande F1 plants are also doing very well in my RBs.

After pulling and picking the Pike beans I transplanted Castle Dome Broccoli into the bed. A picture is attached.
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