Beans (i.e. legumes)
General information
- Description: Great climbing plants! Whether you like black beans, kidney beans, green beans, or peas, there are an endless number of legumes out there to grow.
- Education:
- JohnnySeeds.com ("Bean Basics")
- How to grow Chickpeas, Garbanzo beans. Sow indoors until 3-4" tall. Sow outdoors after last frost or when night temperatures do not dip below 65°F. Companion plants are: potatoes, cucumber, corn, strawberries, celery, but not garlic. Plant 4-8 plants per household consumer. Fertilizers: do not add Nitrogen of the NPK formula.
- Types: Beans can be divided into pole and bush types, where: pole (or vining) beans require a trellis and bush beans are free standing. Another difference is between snap and shell beans. Snap beans can be eaten raw, pod and all, while shell beans are meant to be opened up, or shelled, so the seeds inside can be eaten and the pods thrown away. However, most beans can be eaten pod and all if they’re immature enough, and most beans will have to be shelled if they’re allowed to mature or even dry out. Different varieties of bean plants are bred for both, however, which means that a bean marketed as a snap bean will taste much better raw than one marketed as a shell bean.
- Growing tips:
- Use netting against birds on peas.
- Plant peas in early spring when soil temperatures are over 40F and over 60F for beans.
- Top off the plants when they reach maximum trellis height. This will result in newer vines to start from the bottom and yield more beans.
- Harvest regularly which will cause the plant to produce more beans.
- Fertilizer: Peanuts, soybeans, favabeans get their nitrogen from the air. However, all others will require some nitrogen fertilizer even though they will also fix nitrogen.
- Companion planting: Beans and peas (as well as cucumbers and squash) will help tomatoes. See Best and Worst Companion Plants for Tomatoes and 35 Companion Plants To Grow With Your Tomatoes. For example: Beans, Cucumbers, Squash, basil, lettuce and nasturtiums.
- I. Snap beans (Phaseolus vulgaris): Includes green beans (500+ varieties), yellow (or 'wax') beans and peas.
- Green bean varieties: Bush Blue Lake is the favorite variety with huge yields.
- Yellow bean (pole) varieties: Gold Nectar, Grandma Nellie's Yellow Mushroom, Kentucky Wonder Wax, Marvel of Venice, Monte Gusto, Yellow Romano
- Yellow bean (bush) varieties: Brittlewax Bush Snap Bean, Cherokee Wax Bush Snap Bean, Golden Butterwax Bush Snap Bean, Goldrush Bush Snap Bean, Pencil Pod Black Wax Bean.
- II. Shell beans: Includes lima (Phaseolus lunatus) and baby limas (aka butter beans), navy, pinto, kidney, black-eye pea, soybean (Glycine max).
- Lima varieties: Fordhook 242 is the standard for lima beans.
- Pole bean advantages over Bush beans:
- Are sweeter and starchier than the best bush beans
- Longer harvest window.
- Can be harvested upright
- Can be companioned with corn and squash
- Pole bean varieties:
- Flats - wide, Romano-type. Example: Northeaster
- Rounds - long slender. Example: Fortex
- Yard-longs - tropics varieties.
- Pea varieties: See article
- English (Pisum sativum, var. sativum). Includes: 'Green Arrow,' 'Maestro,' 'Lincoln,' and 'Tall Telephone.' Pods are not edible.
- Snow (Pisum sativum var. saccharatum) [aka Chinese pea pods]. Includes: 'Golden Sweet,' 'Mammoth Melting Sugar,' 'Oregon Giant,' and 'Oregon Sugar Pod.' Flat edible pods.
- Sugar Snap (Pisum sativum var. marcrocarpon). Includes: 'Cascadia,' 'Sugar Ann,' 'Sugar Daddy,' and 'Super Sugar Snap.' Cross between English and snow peas.
- Dry beans grown at home advantages:
- More diversity
- "Fresher" than off the shelf at the supermarket.
- Taste better
- Require less cooking time.
- Product listings:
My 'Edamame' selection
- Description: See Growing Edamane
- Varieties:
- Butterbean - one of the tastiest
- Chiba Green - large pods and a darker green color.
- Karikachi - 2' bush plant
- Kuroshinju - sweeter than other varieties
- Midori Giant - early to mature, from etsy.com
- Tohya - flavourful and high percentage of 2-3 bean pods
My 'bush' bean selection
- Varieties:
- Chickpeas (aka Garbanzo bean) - 1.5' tall, botanically neither a bean or pea, from SeedMan.com
- Resistant Cherokee- 58 days, 1-2' tall, yellow pods with black seeds, delicious fresh, frozen or canned, from SeedMan.com
- Adzuki (aka Chinese Red Bean) - 90-120 days, 1-2' tall, very digestible, fast cooking time, from SeedMan.com
My 'pole' bean and/or pea selection
- Varieties (beans):
- Christmas Pole Butterbean - 10' tall, very large lima bean, dark red splashes of color, from SeedMan.com
- Rattlesnake- 10' tall, dark green with purple streaks. Can eat fresh or mature for shelling, from SeedMan.com
- Scarlet Runner - 10-20' tall, bright scarlet flowers, edible blooms, black and purple mottled seeds, from SeedMan.com
- King of the Garden - 7-10' tall, the leading large-seeded pole lima bean, from SeedMan.com
- Blue Lake- 8' tall, green beans, from SeedMan.com
- Varieties (peas):
- Sugar Magnolia - shelling pea, purple, 6-7' vines, from Burpee.com
My 'pea' bush selection
- Varieties:
- Garden Sweet - shelling pea, 2-3' tall, 20-30% sweeter, from Burpee.com
- Little Marvel - shelling pea, 2.5" tall, from UFSeeds.com
- (Calvin's Peas) Sugar Snap (organic) - 2' tall, most flavorful of all snap varieties, from JohnnySeeds.com
- (Calvin's Peas) Royal Snap II - 2' tall, purple pod, from JohnnySeeds.com
- (Calvin's Peas) Honey Snap II - 2.5' tall, yellow pod, from JohnnySeeds.com
2021 Schedule
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