Growing Beans - How Much, When, and How close?

lakelady · January 16, 2012

I love dry beans for all sorts of recipes. I'd like to grow some dry pole types for this year and have a few questions. I know varieties vary in their production, and environmental factors shoud be considered, but is there any sort of rule of thumb for growing them such as for 1 lb dry beans, plant X number of plants? The varieties I have are:

True Red Cranberry
Hidatsa Shield
Good Mother Stallard
Mayflower

Since I have limited space, I thought poles would be best and I can put one setup here, one setup there, that sort of thing to avoid cross pollination and save seed as well. I'd like to get 3-5 lbs per variety if possible, dry.

I also have my green pole and purple podded poles to consider too. How far apart do you think beans need to be to avoid cross pollination? I was thinking of putting them in the new beds I'm going to build 12x3, 2 of them for tomatoes, along sides.

I also got a bush type, but have absolutely no idea where that one is going. As usual, I'll probably seed way more of everything than I have room for, ugh.

Also, last year I planted my pole beans kind of late. Should they go out same time as tomatoes?

Thanks!

Oh, and can I plant pole beans and bush beans near peas or will they be a problem?

January 16, 2012	#1
lakelady Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Aug 2011 Location: northern NJ zone 6b Posts: 1,862	Growing Beans - How Much, When, and How close? I love dry beans for all sorts of recipes. I'd like to grow some dry pole types for this year and have a few questions. I know varieties vary in their production, and environmental factors shoud be considered, but is there any sort of rule of thumb for growing them such as for 1 lb dry beans, plant X number of plants? The varieties I have are: True Red Cranberry Hidatsa Shield Good Mother Stallard Mayflower Since I have limited space, I thought poles would be best and I can put one setup here, one setup there, that sort of thing to avoid cross pollination and save seed as well. I'd like to get 3-5 lbs per variety if possible, dry. I also have my green pole and purple podded poles to consider too. How far apart do you think beans need to be to avoid cross pollination? I was thinking of putting them in the new beds I'm going to build 12x3, 2 of them for tomatoes, along sides. I also got a bush type, but have absolutely no idea where that one is going. As usual, I'll probably seed way more of everything than I have room for, ugh. Also, last year I planted my pole beans kind of late. Should they go out same time as tomatoes? Thanks! Oh, and can I plant pole beans and bush beans near peas or will they be a problem? __________________ Antoniette