Allotments 4 All
Produce => Edible Plants => Topic started by: macmac on July 10, 2009, 16:01:22
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Is anyone having trouble with their beans? ???We've grown both runners and climbing french for years but this year they're not flowering properly and the beans are sparse :(It's not just ours a couple of seasoned "pros" on the lottie seem to have the same problem. any suggestions? and don't say Tescos :P
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runner beans - normal and spagna are flowering prolifically. Pods set on the spagna. Borlotti, Tarbais and Marvel of Venice FBs lots of foliage, not many flowers. Cobra FB not much foliage or flowers, but looks healthy enough
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Spagna growing well but not setting... I think the wet/windy weather has kept the bees away... :-\
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my french beans (dwarf and climbing) are not doing great, they look healthy but very few flowers and beans. The climbers seem to be picking up a little as i noticed some new flowers today but the dwarfs are a waste of space. other years they have been heaving. My runners in a different part of the garden are dripping with blooms. I dont think it can be lack of insect life as i have plenty of that and everything else has been pollinated fine. loads of raspberries and flowers etc.
i sowed some extra frenchies a couple weeks ago and will be keen to see if they do any better. O well, some years there are non starters. last year it was corgettes for me.
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Runner Beans Celebration setting well, others bit iffy. Plenty of flowers.
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My best and earliest set for years, my own saved seed from Enorma about 25 years ago - they are slightly sheltered by the greenhouse from the prevailing wind so maybe that's why they are doing well this year. I did keep them watered in the hot dry spell.
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My climbing French beans were finished off by the flood a week or so ago, but the pea beans are OK.
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my beans are dreadful, patchy germination, slow growth, few flowers
on the other hand my cow peas are doing great.
lbb
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my runners, climbing and dwarf french are doing well but the borlotto although it is looking very healthy and full of leaf there has been only two flowers, today i thought there was signs of one of them setting :-\.
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My Runners are at the top of the poles and in full flower, I have beans froming about 1.5 inches long. My dwarf beans however are rubbish
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They do like a rich soil but honestly beans are very early this year I rather think that the heat and rain we have had has forced on the growth of the plants
I feel sure that so long as the plants look otherwise healthy they will produce flowers and beans will follow.
My broadbeans are all harvested. The runners are well over the top of the frame and have tons of flowers. French beans both dwarf and climbing seem to be coming along steadily but not as fast as the runners which are way ahead of time.
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Mine (Enorma) are rubbish. Think I may plant in a more sheltered spot, between greenhouse and garage next year. We do have really strong winds in the Fens.
The trench was filled with well rotted horse manure, suppled by Granddaughters horse.
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Spagna growing well but not setting... I think the wet/windy weather has kept the bees away... :-\
I thought beans self pollinated before the flower even fully opens, no bees required.
It's been dry here, we have no visible bean set yet.
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My experiment of growing climbing french beans behind tomatoes on a frame seems to be working well, the beans are well above the tomatoes now, and the tomatoes seem very healthy too. My plan is that when the tomatoes get blight (as they inevitably seem to get every summer........)and I have to remove them to ripen the fruit in the shed, the beans will still be there so I won't have wasted any space. Well, that's the plan anyway....... :-\
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Loadsa beans here. The runners on the left are from saved seed given to me by a lottie neighbour - some white flowered, some red flowered and some painted lady. Have grown a mixture of all but so far only the white flowered plants have produced pickable beans. The others have set. Also have some Wisley Magic, my usual favourite, not yet in production. The french beans on the right are Cupidon, which have been wonderful this year, have eaten a lot, frozen some. The beans in the middle are from a climbing french bean that hasn't climbed, and I have lost the label, can anyone perhaps identify them? Also got borlottis and orca beans in flower. Think I may grow fewer beans next year but do love 'em!
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I don't think your alone with this as my beans are just coming into their own. I have one bean which is ready and the rest are about an inch long. I think that I had put them in a bit late and they have yet to show what a good cropper they are.
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Pickedmy first few dwarf french yesterday- amixture of varieties sent by someone here- checked my pm's but can't remember who it was. :-[
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I thought beans self pollinated before the flower even fully opens, no bees required.
French beans self fertile but runners and broad beans not self fertile so need bees, usually bumblebees.
Spagna is technically a runner bean rather than a butter bean so presume that it needs those bees.
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my first lot of french beans that I started inside were rubbish and died as soon as they were planted out but the ones that I planted direct are doing well.
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Mine aren't brilliant either although they've just started to 'whoosh' a bit this past week or so in terms of height and leaf growth. There are a few flowers on the enorma plant and I picked about four beans today but nothing else seems to be doing very well. My inaugural attempt at broad beans was a dismal failure but I take the blame for that in part, being new etc.
Maybe it will be a late kick off this year and we'll all get a glut in a few weeks? :)
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No problems here!, runners doing well enuff to come 1st at local show!! (loads of bumble bees about, as usual I have a nest on my plot) ;)
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Panic.
I just had a look at one of my runner plants and it has wilted beyond help.
The flowers have dropped and the beans have shrivelled up.
Unsure what has happened to it.
Oh well there is always more coming along, and you cant get it right all the time. :(
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I have planted far too many bean seed and they are all growing like the triffids.. I sowed french runners first into pots, then planted out late April and they have produced a harvest already. Then i sowed direct another type of French and English climbing bean ( somebody on the plot gave me the seed ) not sure what they are but they have delicate pink blush colour flowers like on the other french runners, and they are looking sooo healthy and have started to set.. Then i sowed my main crop of Runner beans direct into the soil, late April, and they are extremely healthy and are bushing out like mad.. loads of flowers on all the beans. I have another bed with Runners beans that the same person gave to me as plants and they are growing like mad too, really thick shoots. Everyone elses beans seem to be slow, and everyone asks me what have i done to them.. I just gave them a good soil structure to start with and maybe thats what they like.. I don;t dig any trenches i just put them in.. My Mother always grew great tasting succulent beans so maybe its hereditory..... ;D
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My dwarf fench are doing great and I'll be picking the 1st lot this week, the climbers and runners are sporadic and show no signs of beans yet. Don't really understand why the difference but will enjoy what I pick this week anyway :D
1066
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Oh and here was I thinking that at last I got a GREAT bean crop! OK i have got some blackfly on some of them, but I just wash it off the beans once I have picked them!
I am growing Yellow Kingswax, some Fin des Bagnols dwarfs and first time, Cobra French Climbers and they are fab! I will definitely get them again, and they were really cheap from Alan Romans.
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Cobra....climbing french...terrible germination % less than half and many of the plants that grew were distorted, I now think it was the fault of the potting mix however they're doing well now they're planted out and i have lots of flowers and had a handful of beans and i can see lots more coming. They grow quite quickly once they've formed.
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climbing french beans doing OK..... purple podded and blue lake are setting beans.
just sowed a few runners at the weekend - are these too late??
(have been reading about "succession" and trying to extend the crop)
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I'm only growing Blauhilde(sp?) this year. The slugs gave them a hard time of it to start with and it's a good job I had plenty of spares to plant. They've climbed to about 7 feet but look quite weedy and no flowers yet. I keep telling myself there's time yet.
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I'm only growing Blauhilde(sp?) this year. The slugs gave them a hard time of it to start with and it's a good job I had plenty of spares to plant. They've climbed to about 7 feet but look quite weedy and no flowers yet. I keep telling myself there's time yet.
I am also growing Blauhilde as well as some others which were given to me...but they're all a bit weedy. Will keep feeding and watering and see what happens....its a big learning curve isn't it??? ::) ::)