An Experiment With Heirloom Bean Seeds

tommy — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 23:13:50 +0000

This year my family planted several varieties of heirloom bean seeds we purchased from Seed Savers Exchange. We tried Painted Pony, Calypso, Speckled Cranberry, and Brockton. We planted the seeds directly into the garden in early June after our long, wet spring. Since we only purchased one packet of each, we were able to seed a 10 foot row of each variety. As with a lot of heirloom vegetables, the germination percentage was anywhere between 70-90%.

Heirloom Beans: Painted Pony, Speckled Cranberry, and Calypso

After the beans were up for about two to three weeks we had a grasshopper invasion. About 50% of our seedlings were eaten. And if that wasn’t bad enough we had a loss of another 10-20% to disease within the next month. At this time we were getting pretty discouraged.

In mid September, we were able to harvest a few dry pods from our Calypso plants (all three of them!). Just a few days ago we harvested the last of our dry pods. The Brockton variety, though our toughest and most prolific, did not have enough time before the frost set in to mature any seeds. And, even though we did not have many Calypso plants, they ripened the earliest as I mentioned above. We harvested just two pods of Speckled Cranberry, a late ripening type. The Painted Pony plants, however, performed the best in terms of the amount of dry bean seed we were able to collect.

I should mention that all of the varieties produced fresh green beans in abundance. But, since we were interested in collecting seeds only, I do not have an edible flavor comparison to share.

In subsequent years we will probably plant twice as many as we want to grow to mature plants. In addition, we will focus on shorter season varieties when we want to harvest dry seeds for saving.

Overall our experiment with heirloom bean seeds was fun. The best part was watching the kids open the dried pods to find the brightly colored beans inside….the simple joys of gardening at their best!

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Grasshoppers Are Taking Over

tommy — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 18:36:52 +0000

We live in a rural area and are surrounded by fields of weeds, hay, and rocks. In fact, our own property fits this description as well. This makes for a wonderfully peaceful place to live and raise our two boys. This beauty also comes at a price. This year it is the grasshopper pressure.

We began to notice a few over the past several months. Now when we walk near a patch of weeds or our garden, it’s like the entire area comes alive. Our poor potato plants are literally skeletons of their former selves while the tubers are full grown and safe below ground.

We planted bush beans late (June 30). They were not as lucky as the grasshoppers totally annihilated them, stems and all. They disappeared within three days!

Needless to say we are having a tough time with these pests. Maybe next year will be better.

The Gardening Everyday » grasshopper damage

An Experiment With Heirloom Bean Seeds

Grasshoppers Are Taking Over