Topic: Soaking Beans to speed germination...does it work

[dingerbell]

 :( Went to the Lottie this morning for the usual inspection and all of my Bean plants have been eaten by some nasty seedling munching Alien beastie!!!! I now have to hastily grow replacements. I'm growing Cobra Climbing French and Borlotti. My question is, can I speed up the germination process of my new plants by soaking overnight (advice from the old bearded elders at the pub) I ask this because the first batch took forever to germinate and not a very good success rate (about 60%)
Thanks and I'm now off to polish the 12 bore to catch the B......s that ate my babies... ;D

[Curryandchips]

I often soak my beans to 'wake them up', but like so many things, I cannot say that it actually does work, it just appears to ...

[bennettsleg]

good question, I have been wondering the same.  judging by my peas, pre-soaking gets them really started and you can winnow out the no-shows, saving on effort etc. I shall be soaking my beans for sure.

[sallyann]

Hi,

(I am assuming by climbing french you mean french beans, but I know i could well be wrong.....)

I read somewhere (in a reliable gardening book) that you should not soak french bean seeds. I can't remember exactly why it was bad, something to do with disease susceptibility I think.

Before I read the book I sowed some french beans, I presoaked half for about an hour and didn't soak the rest. The germination rate was pretty much the same as was the time it took the seeds to germinate, if anything the non-soaked beans had a slightly higher germination rate.

I sowed my french beans in pots and i think they only took about 5 or 6 days. I also did some runner beans in pots without soaking and again these took about a week to germinate.

Hope this helps,

Sallyann

[dandelion]

I soaked my French beans for 24 hours. Germination rate was 0% >:(! I sowed a second batch without soaking. Germination was still poor, about 50%. I think there were fungus spores on the seed and this made the beans rot.

[plot51A]

I had some rahter old dwarf french bean seed that I decided to soak and pregerminate. Although I only potted up those that had started showing little roots they took ages to show through and then I didn't get 100%. I think French beans are not supposed to like wet conditions so that probably accounts for it! Wouldn't soak or sprout again.

[Meg]

Those little blighters. Never mind you could try both ways and do a trial!!

[supersprout]

When I've had failures from pre-sprouting French or runner beans, it's been either from over-soaking, or leaving the sprout to get too long, or letting them go mouldy :-[

I soak for 4-5 hours maximum, then drain and leave between two layers of damp flannel for 24-48 hours in a warm place, until the little root sprouts just start showing. My beans will always get the plumping treatment if I want them up fast. If I'm in a hurry, feeling lazy or not too worried about when they emerge later in the season (i.e. for succession) they go in dry.

Last year (late June) I sowed both 'dry' beans (without pre-soak) and pre-plumped, and the plumped ones were up a good 10 days before the dry ones (there wasn't much rain at the time).

[slippy fly]

I lay mine out on kitchen roll then lay a piece on top then wet the kitchen roll.Last year I left them until they started to germinate then I planted them out and it ensured a 100% success rate.

[powerspade]

With runner beans I fill up a plastic bag with some compost, pop the bean into the bag and leave for about a week, or until their tails appear then I pot up and grow on until big enough to plant outside