Tepary Beans

[flowerweaver]

After last year's success with teparies, this year was a total loss. I planted one large area down in the wash with white ones and May's flood swept them away; I also planted a small patch of my landrace teparies up in a field and they prolifically produced immature beans. I think they had too much water followed by not enough, since I never laid irrigation on them.

[steev]

My tepary year was also crap; planted a large patch of Blue-Speckled, of which there was nearly zero germination. Didn't look promising to plant others; if the rain comes decently, I'm optimistic about next year.

[zeedman]

I've had success in my first attempt at growing teparies... but it became a "be careful what you wish for" situation.

The virus-free white teparies I started in pots were transplanted into two locations; one on the South side of the garage (the warmest site I have) and in my rural garden. In both locations, the plants grew into ground-smothering mats 24-30" wide. The runners would twine around anything they encountered (especially the neighboring plants 12" apart in the row) but seldom made an effort to climb. Flowers appeared late, and were solitary. The first pods which appeared were hollow shells, with no viable seed; but later pods were filled, and more continue to be set. I've been harvesting dry seed for about 2 weeks now... but it is a difficult task, due to the small pods (1.5-2" long) and having to dig through the mat to find them. I'll harvest enough seed to share, but quite honestly, I just don't have time to pick them all. It would take an hour to pick a cup full of pods. Are all teparies so darn small???

I'll try to post a photo of the plants in the near future.

[raymondo]

Do teparies cook up more easily than common beans?

[Joseph Lofthouse]

The two varieties of teparies that I have grown are small. Because of that, they cook up relatively quickly.

I typically harvest tepary beans by cutting whole plants off just above ground level, and rolling the vines up into a ball and drying them a for a couple days over a tarp. Then jump up and down on them to release the beans.

[zeedman]

Sept 20, 2015 23:53:34 GMT -5 Joseph Lofthouse said:

The two varieties of teparies that I have grown are small. Because of that, they cook up relatively quickly.

I typically harvest tepary beans by cutting whole plants off just above ground level, and rolling the vines up into a ball and drying them a for a couple days over a tarp. Then jump up and down on them to release the beans.

That sounds like a good method, one I was already considering. It is just too time consuming trying to harvest individual pods (although I did so again today). There are enough mature pods already set that I won't feel guilty pulling the plants... and I notice that the pods shatter very easily, so it won't take much threshing to free the seed. Who knows, I might even get enough to try eating some. Rain expected Thursday, I'll pull the plants before then.

[steev]

Teparies are reputed to cook slowly, but that may be off-set by their small size.

I had zero sprout from the patch of Blue-Speckled I seeded this year, but my theory is that I can grow a crop, clip them off when mature, bundle them in a burlap tarp, hang them to dry (away from rodents), and beat them with a ball-bat to thresh.

[DarJones]

Which just goes to show that stomp-em and whack-um beans are a real thing. Remind me to be careful around Steve and Zeedman, between them, they could be dangerous.

[flowerweaver]

Although teparies are considered ephemerals rather than annuals, mine produced over a several month period. I am wondering if this is because I have such a long growing season. If I followed the Joseph Lofthouse method I would have lost the second half of my crop; had I waited until the end the first half would have already shattered. So I pick daily.

Compared to common beans I find them to have a more dense texture like favas, they retain their shape after cooking and don't make much pot liquor.

[steev]

Mine also have long production (when they grow!), but my desire to not hand-pick when I have a large planting leads me to think of less labor-intensive methods of harvest. One possibility of the inevitable shattering of early-ripening pods of teparies might eventually be some degree of self-seeding; I'm always pleased by things that just pop up. Aside from that, I want plantings of these small legumes large enough that I can afford the inevitable shattering loss, and have poultry I can turn in to the harvested plot, to glean the scattered riches.

Yes; between Zeedman and myself might well be a dangerous place to be, though I'm sure we are neither individually nor collectively intentionally dangerous (well, me, at least; can't speak for him).

[zeedman]

Well, I took advantage of the 80 degree October day, and used it to thresh out the pulled tepary vines. Tried the stomping method, but seeds were flying off the tarp; so I settled for punching through the balled-up vines with heavy leather gloves, which worked well. Did it in the back patio, I figured if the neighbors saw me punching furiously on a pile of dead vines, they'd figure I'd lost my marbles. After winnowing, cleaning, and culling, I have about 2 pounds of seed... which is better than I expected. Now I'll be searching for a good recipe to try them. The hand-picked seed will be set aside for planting & sharing.

The dry beans seem to very susceptible to spoilage from rainfall if left on the vine, so losses would probably have been heavy, had conditions not been unusually dry this year. For that reason, they seem to be poorly adapted to my climate, and I may not grow them again except to replenish seed... but it was an interesting experiment.

Incidentally, I had previously stated that based upon my observations of these teparies growing on Heritage Farm that the growth habit was 3A; but the vines were heavily inter-twined, so I would revise that habit to be 3B.

[oxbowfarm]

Interesting news, and some ego gratification for my farm. Anne Hallee at Fedco seeds replicated the Mitla Black vs other tepary beans comparison trial I did, even more carefully. "we grew it out in 2014 alongside four genuine tepary beans. We found... its morphology to be obviously different from that of the true teparies while consistent with the vulgaris species. Even more telling was its different adaptation: Mitla thrived in our cooler but moist climate, but the true teparies, better adapted to the extremely arid Sonoran desert, melted down and had almost no bean set." from the lastest 2016 Fedco catalog. I am happy to see independent confirmation of my results. To me the most telling indicator of all is how prepotent the bean is with any and all vulgaris it grows near. Mitla Black love children everywhere. Really cool if you like segregating populations, nightmares for a bean collector.

[Joseph Lofthouse]

Tim: Good work! I loved this part of the description of "Black Mitla" in the Fedco Catalog: "Though this variety has come down to us as a tepary bean, it is not. Acting on a tip from Tim Springston of Oxbow Farm in Erin, NY, we grew it out in 2014 alongside four genuine tepary beans. We found, as did Springston, its morphology to be obviously different from that of the true teparies while consistent with the vulgaris species."

Nice! I found 3 catalogs that are calling it a common bean now.

[farmermike]

I had a similar experience while I was studying agroecology in Prescott, AZ, in 2010. A friend gave me some little black beans, which he claimed were tepary beans from the Hopi reservation. Upon planting, I immediately suspected that they weren't actually P. acutifolius--by comparison to all the teparies we were growing at our school farm. They were however very vigorous, early-maturing, and pretty determinate (they usually dry up their crop and die very early, even if they are still being irrigated). They have been my favorite dry bean to grow ever since.

Maybe my friend was misinformed, and they are actually Black Mitla, but I wonder if there are other "tepary like", P. vulgaris black beans going around the southwest. NS/S has a few other small black beans, and the seeds look very unlike their black tepary listings (which are very angular and blocky). I also wonder if there are "tepary like" beans in other colors, or is that morphology unique to the black?

My experience with real teparies is very limitied, but now that I am gardening on sandy fast-draining soil, maybe I should do some trials.

Mike

[Joseph Lofthouse]

At the end of 2015, my tepary bean grex contained two varieties, grey-speckled from steev and yellow from Rocky Mountain Seed Alliance.



I have continued to grow tepary beans. flowerweaver sent me her landrace, and a few varieties from that did well here. So in 2016 I added a few new colors to the mix including white, gray, and tans.



Before the 2017 growing season andyb send me F2 [Blue Speckled x Paiute White] tepary beans. I feel honored to be trusted with them. So that added brown and black colored beans to the mix. I'm hyped about growing segregating hybrids. That'll provide lots of opportunities to find families that grow well for me.