Favas - Broad Beans - Horse Beans - Pigeon Beans

[petitvilaincanard]

My favas this year...



This are my favas dumont/nuts grex at my place,500m elevetion.The plants at full size(end of flowering).The stick indicates the height,but the light on the foto makes the marks hard to see.They reach a somewhat below 1m,that's roughly 3'.They were planted 2e half of october The photo is taken 8 mai


And this is the same grex fully grown out (after flowering)planted at the same period,but at Trébas les bains,were I participate in a common garden.
It is in the valley of the Tarn at about 200m elevation.The red mark on the stick is 1.5m,the white mark is 1.25m.As you can see they are over 1.25 high,that's over 4'.This photo is taken 8 mai,like the first one.


So,it seems thats climate affect the final size of the plants from this grex but not somuch the time of ripening,

Now the 'nuts extra cold resistant',the f3 progeny of a cross between pigeon beans and broad beans,that effectevely look like 'horse beans' that survived (0.5 % survival) very cold conditions(min temp between -10 and -15 C for two weeks).
Planting time was equally 2e half of october.
It was planted at the north-west side close to my house.Sun only the afternoon and in winter only very few ours a day,Not such a good place for winter.
Nevertheles they did amazingly well.The reached full size 10 days later then the first two patches.Foto taken 18 mai,to nearly 1.25 m,that's 3'


That makes me think that my horsebeans have good vigor and like cold conditions.
Next year I have to plant nuts extra cold resistant in Trébas too to see how it compares to dumont/nuts grex in warmer conditions.

A pic of a typical red stem of the nuts extra cold resistant

and the nice flowers

[robertb]

I'm not sure how to put a pic on here, but my first planting is about a foot high, and flowering. I've never had four foor BB's yet; I've always found in the past that small seeded beans did notably better than large seeded. I'm now growing them in a raised bed, and both are growing equally well. I don't think there's any doubt that it was the waterlogging which caused problems.

[richardw]

Great seeing your photos petitvilaincanard,you are getting a similar height to your fava's in Tarn as i get with my NZ heirloom variety,i do find though if i space each plant to about 30-40cm they'll get just as tall but that i wont need any support against the strong winds we get a lot of in New Zealand

[steev]

Last week-end, I wasn't happy, looking at my two varieties of favas; I think I'll be lucky to get seed replacement.

[Joseph Lofthouse]

Steev: Are your favas as short as mine? I think mine are up to 4" already and flowering their fool heads off in weather that is unlikely to lead to seed set!!! I am growing favas in other fields a few of which have already set pods. "Seed replacement"? Seems like a daydream for fava beans.

[steev]

Yeah, that's about it; they're looking pretty scorchy/crappy. I don't blame them; it's gotten so hot, so soon.

[richardw]

So how hot is hot??,i never notice any difference in height when i sow mid summer compared to spring/autumn sown

[Joseph Lofthouse]

Jun 4, 2014 14:12:33 GMT -5 richardw said:

So how hot is hot??,i never notice any difference in height when i sow mid summer compared to spring/autumn sown

30 C to 35 C in late afternoon. 10 C at sunrise. Relative Humidity 10% to 15% at sunset!!!. I think technically that it's the low humidity that does them in.

[richardw]

The eastern side of the South Island where i am get a lot of Foehns NW winds in summer that would push the temps up around that 30 C to 35 C mark and relative Humidities of 10% to 25% over the 24 hour day/night,but thats not every day during summer,we will get to odd 3-4 days period in between of cooler damp weather,maybe thats why?

[Joseph Lofthouse]

I counted pods on the fava patch that is doing the best... They were a genetically diverse population that was planted soon after the winter snow cover melted. 60% of the plants haven't produced any pods, even though they have been flowering for a long time. 70% of the plants that have managed to produce pods only produced one or two pods. One plant produced 7 pods. So it's looking like there might be some possibility of selecting for a population that does better here. I have 3 other patches growing, but it's still to soon to estimate how they are doing.

The leaves look horrid. All curled up like they are dehydrated.

[Joseph Lofthouse]

Here's what one of the other fava patches looked like yesterday. Seed set on a few of the plants!!!

[blueadzuki]

Is that a feverole or a large seeded fava? Pod is at a size where it could be either by look.

Actually the pods on the one plant I still have (which is a feverole) are almost that size now. Well 4 of them are (there are 10 or so on top of that that look fat enough along they COULD be non aborting.

[Joseph Lofthouse]

Jun 26, 2014 11:34:34 GMT -5 blueadzuki said:

Is that a feverole or a large seeded fava? Pod is at a size where it could be either by look.

I don't know yet. I planted feves, feveroles, and fevettes all jumbled together. The next plant over has much smaller pods so I'm thinking fevettes for the next plant over. (Yes I said pods!, but only 2 pods.)

[flowerweaver]

For three years I grew spring planted favas that I started early in the greenhouse, and they always suffered once it got hot. I could get them to bloom and then they died. Last year I fall planted them, and this was the first year I got beans. My plants were irrigated and only grew about a foot tall. I noted the ones that received light partial shade from a mesquite tree grew about 18 inches tall, but in the end they didn't produce any more or less than the others.

They were all Windsors. Out of 25 plants I harvested a motley handful of beans. Although it looks like a failure, to get them to produce anything in this extreme existence unlike their preferred one is nothing short of a miracle. I'm going to try a wider variety of favas one more time this fall.

[Joseph Lofthouse]

Jun 27, 2014 9:38:31 GMT -5 flowerweaver said:

flowerweaver: A glorious success. You almost broke even!!! Can't do that perpetually, but if you do it enough times with enough genetic diversity you may eventually develop a variety that works for you. Last year was my second year growing spring planted favas. The first year I had zero harvest (Newby mistake of planting them in June). The second year I harvested less seed than went into the ground. I didn't come as close to breaking even as you did. About half of the plants didn't produce any beans at all. This spring I replanted the seed. One of the plants is on track to produce somewhere around 20-30 seeds... (Yes I'm already counting beans in the pods.)