Pole Beans

[shelleybean]

I remember several of us planned to grow McCaslan this summer and wanted to see what others thought of it. I really like this bean. It's been stringless, has good flavor and is producing well. I've been picking mine between 5 and 7 inches long. I guess the Japanese beetles liked them too, but I took care of them.

[Zana]

I've got Christmas Pole Lima, Kentucky Wonder, Uncle Steve's Italian Pole, Yard Long and "Waterloo County Mennonite Pole Bean"(I'm still trying to get the true name for it from the Doon Heritage Crossroads Museum's Gardens Curator. This is an old Amish Mennonite variety from early Waterloo County settlers of Swiss or Russian origins.). They're all growing in containers.

[shelleybean]

Wow! In containers Fantastic! I am also growing Willow Leaf White limas and Kentucky Wonder Wax. My lima beans are just now producing pods because I waited for my peas to finish up before I planted those. They look good. I am not impressed with the KW Wax. Very stringy and I don't like the texture unless I pick them at about three inches long.

[Adenn1]

My first attempt at seeding failed...darn bugs and weather...so I got a late start this year. Have had a couple of meals of Rattlesnake and McCaslan...good beans. Not sure about Missouri Wonder...have had a few and they seem to have strings...not what I wanted. Blue Lake is a healthy plant and now just flowering. The JB's really seem to like Blue Lake...I tried some home made soap spray on them...but they just continued to eat away...so I had to nuke the plant with you know what...must have killed nearly 70 beatles.

[rxkeith]

updating my pole bean report here.

meraviglia di venezia is producing a nice crop of large good tasting flat yellow beans, for about 10 days now. fairly early, which is important for my area. i will be saving seeds for next year. vines are healthy and growing.

fortex started producing about the same time as meraviglia. long slender green beans that taste good raw and cooked. vines seem on the puny side but, still a lot of beans out there.

uncle steve is just now starting to produce beans. they are 10-14 days behind the other two varieties. vines are robust as usual and growing all over the place.

caseknife had 2 seeds left from a couple years ago. one seed sprouted, and is doing well. about a week ahead of uncle steve. saving seeds.

oregon giant had one seed in the seed box. it grew. the vine is pretty big, approaching 7 ft in size. only buds on this one still. if any seed saving is to be done it better hurry up. the last week of august has really cooled off here.

this year has been very dry in the keweenaw peninsula. the garden needs daily watering which can't be done on the days we work on account of the farm being 2 & 1/2 hours from our job in ironwood.

so, how are all of your pole beans doing?

keith in calumet

[Adenn1]

Missouri Wonder won't be back...flavor for me okay...but I found it quickly develops strings even at a smaller size. McCaslan is good as always and I do like Blue Lake. Rattlesnake this year is also having a tendency to produce stirngs...something I did not find to be true the last couple of years.

Next year I want to try Fortex and some other new ones...guess I have the winter to look the catalogs over.

[Ruth_10]

Originally Posted by Adenn1

Missouri Wonder won't be back...flavor for me okay...but I found it quickly develops strings even at a smaller size. McCaslan is good as always and I do like Blue Lake. Rattlesnake this year is also having a tendency to produce stirngs...something I did not find to be true the last couple of years.

Next year I want to try Fortex and some other new ones...guess I have the winter to look the catalogs over.

We tried Missouri Wonder in 2006 and it didn't do well, though, in all fairness, none of the beans did that well. I also grew Rattlesnake last year and it was nothing special. Maybe I should try it again, given the poor weather conditions. This year our main croppers were Blue Lake and Kentucky Blue. The Kentucky Blue had some strings but were earlier than the Blue Lake. For us, Blue Lake are the ones to beat. Both had very good flavor.

I think you will like Fortex. I've grown them for three years now and always enjoyed the beans. The plants do not seem to me to be fully poles--more like three-quarters.

New to us this year were Brown Speckled Greasy beans. I can't say I've developed a taste yet for shelly-type beans.

[Zana]

Ok, first of all my stuff was all late in getting planted. So am quite late to have ripe stuff. However, I've been able to pick about a pound of the Waterloo County Mennonite Pole Bean so far. Just wanted a nibble. Going to grow most for seed this year, so other than the occasional nibble, I won't be picking more til the seed is mature.
Uncle Steve's Italian Pole Bean has some that are now about 1 to 2 inches long. I expect I should be able to try some within the week.
Kentucky Wonder is in flower, as is the Dixie Speckled Butterpea (okay not a pole, but still late). The Christmas Pole Lima Bean is about to get pulled. Something has been devouring them....and they're so stunted they're not worth the space they're taking up.
So far, I'd have to say the WCMPB and Uncle Steve's Italian are producing the most, but days are early yet. But judging on past experience, my first year growing the WCMPB, I planted 6 plants and must've harvested close to 40lbs of beans! Not too shabby....and quite tasty to boot. I may just limit myself to the two next year, that is if I've got anywhere to plant them. Sighhhhh... That's one of the reasons I want to grow out for seed this year.

[rxkeith]

zana

keep an eye on those uncle steve beans. they can sneak up on you and then bamm, you'll have a bunch ready to pick before you know it.

keith in calumet

[Zana]

Thanks for the heads up Keith. I'll be keeping a close eye on them.

[Tormato]

Keith,

Have you tried starting a few plants indoors, and then transplanting after the last frost? I tried it this year. I started harvesting on June 30th. The same variety sown outside after the last frost, early August.

Ruth, Rattlesnake was not impressive here, the past two years. It will not be coming back, for me.

I think I'm going with Jeminez, and maybe a Jeminez cross, next year.

Gary

[rxkeith]

gary

sometimes, i'll start a few seeds indoors earlier. i did that with my one oregon giant, and 2 case knife seeds. usually i end up running out of space with tomato, pepper, and other seedlings, and no room for bean seeds. i need to do that next year with a couple varieties that i'm low on seeds with. one year when i lived in detroit, i started some seeds in a strawberry flat that i put in the rear window of my parents car. i had a nice greenhouse on wheels. i got beans a few weeks earlier that year. here in calumet, that can make a big difference.

keith in calumet

[gardengalrn]

For several years, Rattlesnake was my favorite. I plant some different varieties each year and will say Fortex is a new favorite. Kentucky Wonder is always a good canning bean, too. I've found what I enjoy best as fresh is different from what I like to can. Fresh, I like the Rattlesnake and Fortex. I like a more "rounded" bean for canning and Kentucky Wonder, or some of those off-shoots are really good for that. Lori

[tjg911]

for pole beans

i live on pole beans in the months of august and september. i planted on time (memorial day) and so far i have picked pole beans 2 or 3 times. my total harvest is about 2 pounds , for perspective that should be 30-40 pounds by now. yesterday i had a big harvest of 10 kentucky wonder (kw) and 9 romano beans i call ralph's pole bean (rpb).

i may have caused this problem with rpb but the ky problem is a combination of nature and me.

i use a steel trellis 8' long in full sun. 1 side is rpb planted 6" on center. the other side is 4' of ky 6" on center then 5 county fair cukes. the trellis is oriented so plants face east and west, typically south end does a bit better than north end but all i described is standard growing pracice for years except pole beans are seeded 4" while this year i seeded them at 6".

i planted only 8 seeds of the kw as they produce so vigrously and such long pods. 1/2 of the 8 got hit with bean mossaic virus produced nothing and are dying. the other 1/2 of the kw are being smothered by incredibly aggressive growth from the cukes on the south end of the trellis, they were not this extreme last season. so the cukes are covering the other 1/2 of the kw. on top of all that, jap beetles just LOVE kw, they don't even touch the rpb! the beetles ate the kw badly. so my kw harvest is about 5% of normal. i ate 1 meal of them a week ago of about 12 bean pods.

the rpb throw off a lot of vines, i think 6" is too close. i even planted seeds at 6" departing from the typical 4" of the past but seriously think 12" on center is better. it's just a tangled mess but that is not the problem just par for the course. the problem with rpb started when deer started to nibble the leaves. so to "protect" them i stupidly covered them with pieces of concrete re enforcing wire and welded wire 2" X 4" grid that leaned against the trellis about 2' from the growing plants. oh this worked just fine, that is until the beans started to grow into the "new trellis" i put there! i unwound vines but then it got to be too much. after rains when i was unable to go out for a couple of days, it just got out of control so then i just let rpb grow. so i ended up with 2 trellis, the outer plants now shade the original vines. did i mention the super aggressive county fair cukes are now growing thru and over their side of the trellis and drooping over the rpb vines covering 1/2 of them! putting the "deer protection" fencing over the rpb seems to have caused both levels of plants to grow but most of the vines are not producing many if any flowers and rpb does produce many flowers. it produces tons of beans. i'm fertillizing as normal in past years. if i picked 1 pound i'd be streching the truth.

it's just a disaster! oh, i pick about 18-25 cukes every 3-5 days! i like cukes but not like the way i like pole beans. i'm really unhappy and with just 30 days to go i wonder if i'll get many pole beans at all at this rate.

NEXT year, the county fair cukes are not going on the trellis... PERIOD! ONE plant will be put inside 1 crw tomato cage to wind thru it. i'll plant just TWO plants each one in its own crw cage. the trellis will have just 8 rpb and just 8 kw plants on each side. i have over crowded beans like this at 3" and 4" spacing in past years even with cukes on past of the trellis. never saw anything like this disaster.

what a mess!

tom

[Tormato]

Tom,

Sounds like you got yourself into a pickle.

Gary