Topic: Another 'should have gone to spec savers'

[ACE]

My dwarf french beans are growing with tendrils. Packet has gone so I can only suppose they were climbing french beans. I have had to make a quick trellis with short bamboos and string which is all I have at present. Do they get very high? Or shall I go coppicing for taller sticks. 3 long rows growing beautifully.

[Jayb]

If they are climbers they get pretty tall, a good 6'+ for climbing varieties. Though to confuse things, some 'dwarf' varieties can have short runners on them and grow to around 3'.

[picman]

Jayb is correct I had some 'Tendergreen' from fothergills , last year , some but not all, really went for it, had to give them canes, thought an error at the 'factory'. I planted more this year and pinched out the top as an ( another) experiment...  note... they had small purple and white flowers

[ACE]

I did go out to buy dwarf ones along with a packet of  white runners as I already had some shorter climbing beans, so I must have read the packet.  I reckon they are 'dwarf' climbing French beans. But it was cheap seed so they could be a cross pollination.

[Duke Ellington]

The tendrils bit confuses me because it's peas etc that have tendrils ??

[ACE]

The tendrils bit confuses me because it's peas etc that have tendrils ??

The twisty bits at the top.

Definition of tendril
1
:  a leaf, stipule, or stem modified into a slender spirally coiling sensitive organ serving to attach a climbing plant to its support

[Paulh]

For us non-experts that's just the growing tip! The tendrils are twiddly bits at the end of leaves.

Anyway, may they produce bucketloads of beans for you. Or peas.

[galina]

I know you said you didn't have the packet anymore.  But do you remember any part of the name of this bean?  Bought or swapped seed? If bought and you can't remember the name, maybe you remember WHY you bought them?  From which seed seller (most only have a limited offer of beans)? 

If you remember a bit more about the circumstance of how you got the beans that might give a clue to what they are.  just a suggestion .

Cheap seed- do you go to Lidl or Aldi for cheap seeds?  And by the way, even the cheapest seed must contain what it says on the packet according to seed regulations 

My dwarf french beans are growing with tendrils. Packet has gone so I can only suppose they were climbing french beans. I have had to make a quick trellis with short bamboos and string which is all I have at present. Do they get very high? Or shall I go coppicing for taller sticks. 3 long rows growing beautifully.

[squeezyjohn]

As has been said - quite a few "dwarf" varieties will still try and climb up supports but only to about 3' tall - You can either give them something a bit like pea sticks to keep them standing up, but I've found that they often end up climbing in to eachother and support themselves.

[AnnieD]

As has been said - quite a few "dwarf" varieties will still try and climb up supports but only to about 3' tall - You can either give them something a bit like pea sticks to keep them standing up, but I've found that they often end up climbing in to eachother and support themselves.

We've been doing some walks round the local fields here, a lot of peas are grown. I've noticed how the pea plants are climbing up and supporting each other, no sticks required!

[ACE]

I searched my rubbish bag in the greenhouse and found the packet. Must have been mistaken about them being cheap as they were Suttons which said on the packet 'Borlotto fire tongue dwarf French beans'. Now after looking them up I find that  Thomson and Morgan also sell a borlotto fire tongue but it is classed  an Italian climbing bean. So it gets stranger and stranger. The height on the suttons is stated as 18 to 20 inches  which I suppose is  dwarf, although my French beans in the past are usually about 12 inches high and no long leading shoot. If they stay at that size my short bamboos and string should support them.

[Digeroo]

I have been trying to swat Ace's fly!!!

[galina]

Glad you know now, yes the shortish stakes should work fine

[Borlotti]

That fly is so annoying.

[Digeroo]

Maybe its a pollen beetle.

[Paulh]

Those Borlotti beans are available in both dwarf and climbing versions. I prefer the climbing ones - I think they crop better and the pods aren't trailing on the ground to be munched by molluscs.