Pole beans

[grungy]

Rebsie, any chance at a trade for some of you beans and peas. All we have to offer this year is tomatoes, a couple of winter squashes and two varieties of corn.
Cheers,
Val (grungy)

[Rebsie]

Sure Val, I'm happy to send you anything you want. If you want to make a note of any you're interested in and PM me an address, I'll get them sent off.

Meanwhile I'll try to get my rear end into gear and post a list of what else I've got available.

[macmex]

We grow a good many beans in our rocky Oklahoma clay soil. Here in Oklahoma I've found that I can purchase a welded wire panel, called a cattle panel, for about $20 U.S. (last I checked). The panels are 16 feet long and five feet tall. I drive three metal T posts, which cost about $2.50 a piece and hang the cattle panel on them using baling wire. I hang the panel so that it is a foot above the ground, as the beans can reach that high, and the trellis is then 6' high. I have at least one bean which would reach 20 feet, if given that high of a support. But I'm 6 feet tall and refuse to set a support which goes over 8 feet. The bean plants simply hit the top and loop over. If given enough moisture to survive through the heat of the summer they will produce until frost. The panel and T posts cost a bit. But they are reusable for years to come and never break down with the weight of the plants.

I'm partial to old fashioned string beans such as were most commonly grown in the Appalachian Mountains. Many of these beans are stringless when very young and develop strings as the pods fill out. But the pods themselves remain tender right up until they begin to dry seed. The traditional manner of eating these is to let the pods fill out until they look a little "knobby" and then pick and string and snap them, cooking them just like that. Some string pods may fall apart while cooking. Others remain intact. This produces a delicious mix of green beans and shellie beans.

I'm going to see if I can get a image to show here. This is one of our family heirlooms called Tennessee Cutshort. It fits this category of bean. Such beans are good for snap, shell or dry. But I couldn't bring myself to shell them and discard the pods, since the pods are good!



George

[grungy]

George, you wouldn't be interested in a trade for some tomato seeds or a couple squash varieties, would you?

[canadamike]

I won't say a thing, Grungy, I won't say a thing.

But I'll think about it!!! ;D

[Alan]

Excellent picture my friend. My grandmother always grew cutshorts along with the rest of my family from the Kentucky region of the Appalachian mountain range, I too am returning to these varieties so if you ever have some to trade let me know as I would love to grow these.

I too this year will be using the cattle panel and T post method to grow beans, I have even entertained cutting four foot sections to weld onto the 16 foot sections in order to make a 20 foot section which you could bend over into a tunnel and walk under in order to pick the beans in that manner.

Great information my friend!

[grungy]

It's alright, Mike. Just wait until Vivianne sees whay's headed for your mail box. hehhehehe.

[macmex]

Alan, I have a friend who put two 16' panels together and did an arch. I believe he had to use some posts to stabilize it. He loves it, as does his wife. I'm not sure, as my engineering skills are lacking, but I suspect that the plain 'ol panel on three T posts is more space efficient. Nevertheless, there is some real impact when one sees such an arch.

I can send a sample to anyone (at this point) who sends me a private message with e-mail and land address. I generally ask a dollar plus what the postage actually costs me. I ship in a bubble mailer.

These old string bean varieties are really great, though one has to re-train their expectations when using them. I grew Tennessee Cutshort for years before I finally figured out what was right in front of me: that I liked them better when they were overgrown! We've been accumulating a couple others which are equally as good, and also string beans: Childers Cutshort (Kentucky heirloom, apparently identical to Tennessee Cutshort, Cherokee Striped Cornhill Bean, long curved pods, Ruth Bible and two greasy varieties).

Rebsie, the beans you started this thread with, are their pods tender or tough? Back in the mid 80s I grew a bean called Bogan, which had very similar seed. The pods on Bogan were tough.

Here's a link to Sustainable Mountain Agriculture Center. They have a great write up on this kind of bean. They also sell a good many.

www.heirlooms.org/index.html

Sandhill Preservation Center sells some too, along with Tennessee Cutshort, for the first time this year.

www.sandhillpreservation.com/catalog/bean.html

George

[americangardener]

George.. just sent ya a PM.

Alan... stock up on cattle panels my friend! You're gonna need em next season. I sent you some that i had which i grew out last year. These ones were just labeled cutshort. What they are i'm not sure. The seeds came in a mixture of colors.. reddish, white with black stripings, and a solid bluish grey. When i planted em last year i seperated the different colors. Didn't matter though.. they all grew the same short pole plants and were identical in size and shapes of the pods. So, i harvested em and mixed em all back together the way i got em. Only thing is they're not exactly what i would call a cutshort. They were crowded together in their short little 4-5 inch pods.. but they didn't get so crowded so as to make em have blunt ends. And they were really small seeds. I'd say smaller than your average petit pois type pea. They weren't something i'd like to grow every year myself.. I sent em simply because you asked for em. I suppose i'm just spoiled by having so many better varieties. But, for anyone interested in old varieties.. i guess they're ok. Anyways, Alan.. i sent you some of those and a whole lot of other ones.

Rebsie.. i think i found Kew Blues daddy. I've got one almost identical to your kew blue. It's called blue victor. It's identical in color and shape and coloration of the seeds. Only difference i can see is mine were around ten inches long. Yours don't look nearly that long to me. And mine might of been slightly flatter pods. Great bean though! and i have some seeds i'll send you in your next shipment. Just you might need to remind me if i forget. I'll be sending you another package first thing next month. Got several seeds that would look identical to your San Antonio too.. but i beleive all mine were from bush varieties. And i think most if not all were green podded ones. I can go thru em if you're interested in bush ones. They are some pretty beans.

Anyways.. Let me know if you're interested in trading some of yours George..

Dave

[macmex]

As I understand, there is an area in Tennessee in which they refer to certain beans, which are not quite as crammed together in the pods, as cutshorts. Tennessee Cutshort seems to fit that description. My wife's great aunt and uncle received the seed from a friend whose sister brought the seed back from a visit in Tennessee. They grew it in Salem, Illinois as long as they could garden, giving us a start back in 1985. I'm positive that "Cutshort" was in the original name when it came from Tennessee, as no one in Salem would have heard that term. They simply used it because it came attached to the seed.

George

[Penny]

Those beans look great!
Nice picture.

[Alan]

Macmex, cutshort is an Appalachian region "folk term" that is used to describe exactly what you just spoke about, though it is often used to refer to stub seeded varieties of Greasy beans, be them pole or bush. Lot's of folk related agricultural terms and a rich heritage from that region, I love it there, we have some of that up here in Southern Indiana as many of us here are originally from that region as well.

Dave, I've got $400 set aside just for cattle panels for this season! I look forward to recieving your package greatly my friend! I will send you some stamps in return shortly brother.

Thanks so much!

Oh, by the way, I just saw your post about those "popping beans" did you send some of those as well?

[Wrennie]

No 16' poles for me either. I dont want to need a cherry picker to get to the top of the poles I like a cage or gazebo idea where the vines go up and thenn lay on the top.

[grunt]

You could tie a single 16' pole to a fence post, with lines radiating down from the top. You get to harvest what you can reach as green or shelling beans, and the rest stay up top to be saved for seed when you lower the pole.

[robertb]

It's a common variety over this side of the Atlantic, but I find Cosse Violette more reliable than most. Last year was so terrible with cold, wet and waterlogging, that I had a lot of failures. This one did as well as ever. It's also a very nice green bean.