The Great Bean Experiment--Final Results

          I had almost forgotten that I need to wrap up my bean experiment and share the results. However, I have noticed that some of readers keep coming back, looking for the final installment.

          Each of the last four weeks, I have taken a picture of my harvest. As you can see, the Blue Lake beans in the upper left hand portion of the bowl were the most plentiful, and therefore, making them the earliest of all the five varieties I planted. The broad Northeaster beans on the right were beautiful. Although they were thick and about six inches long, they were tender and stringless. The Royal Burgundy snap beans were just beginning to produce but were having a difficult time setting fruit with our unseasonably high autumn temperatures.

 

          The next week, there were more Blue Lake beans and lovely, long Northeasters. The purple bean plants were still struggling with the heat.

 

 

          As we headed toward mid-October, the Red Noodle beans were the star of the show. They are advertised as being yard-long beans, but are really are better picked at about one foot if the pods are to be cut in small pieces and eaten like green beans. If the pods are allowed to grow long, the beans inside will mature, and they can be shelled and eaten like black-eye peas. The beans inside are basically the size and shape of black-eye peas, but a tiny bit darker.

 

 

          Today I harvested more Red Noodle beans, which I picked a little more immature than the ones the previous week. These pods are about one foot long. The Blue Lake bean plants are finished producing, but the Northeasters are still going like gangbusters. The white flies have slowed them down some, and the bean plants would probably do a whole lot better if I sprayed them with a pesticide. With the season almost over, though, I will not.

 

           The purple snap beans are doing a little better as the weather is cooling, but they have been a bit of a disappointment this year. Perhaps I should have waited until mid-August to plant them. The black-eye pea plants also appeared to be healthy, but produced very few pods.

 

          So, the winners in the garden this year were the Blue Lake beans, the Northeasters, and the Red Noodle beans. Depending on the weather next year, the results might be entirely different.