runner bean competition

[hedgerow pete]

OK people i now throw down the runner bean gauntlet, pick it up if you dare.

on the first of January i will plant 3 runner bean seeds inside the house in a pot. does anyone reckon they can out grow me?

the first to flower and the first to a runner bean at 150mm long 6" of old money.

just in case anyone misses the January start how about we do three seeds each month, Jan, Feb, March, April.

its just for laughs, but I am going stir crazy sat at home without doing any gardening.

there are no rules, grow lights can be used if you have them so can weird and wonderfully fertilizers any thing goes. I just want to be growing some thing and they seam easy for anyone to have a go with.

hedgey

 

[JamezF]

No reason broad beans and garlic can't go in over the winter. My broad beans are out in this year's legume bed under cloches now. I have peas about 6" tall in my polytunnel. Might put a few over-wintering spring onions in to see if they'll germinate.

Daren't pick up the runner bean gauntlet though. My father-in-law is obsessive about runner beans and if I started growing them too he'd probably take offence.

James

 

[Luminos]

...do French beans count? I think I know the answer already...

 

[susbees]

...do French beans count? I think I know the answer already...

I have to agree although be a while before it's frost-safe to stick 'em out. Runners remind me of 1. stringy beans with fillets of inedible sub-skin stuff 2. salted things in ceramic jars. Neither a joyous experience.

On the kitchen windowsill I have baby leeks (10 week variety), baby leaves assorted (very as I haven't a grow bulb on); the beautiful winter cos and pak choi has been decimated by some eediot (child) leaving the greenhouse door open. Grrrrrr....

Starting off some broad beans is harmless, knitting string vests from last year's runners perhaps?

 

[hedgerow pete]

ok frence beans it is if you want.

 

[RoofTops]

Lazy gardeners who haven't pulled up their runner beans yet could have an advantage I think, as the root could be brought inside in a pot and given some warmth - so I think the winner needs to show us a photograph to persuade us it is from a seed sown in 2012.

But I wonder if the roots I dug up could be rescued from the compost heap...

 

[busybee53]

You must be stir crazy hedgerow. All my allotment is getting until March is what Alan Tithmarsh's dad called, "A good coat of looking at". I look at it about 3 times a week when I pick a bit of green. This is the time to look at seed catalogues and plan what weird thing to grow next year.

I usually pick one odd thing each time. It gets the other plot holders guessing. One year it was physalis which is supposed to taste like a cross between pineapple and strawberry (it does not, it is disgusting). The best one was walking stick kale though. They could not work out why my greens were taller than they are. Still got the sticks in the shed.

 

[hedgerow pete]

yep, jersey cabbage i used to call them, i won a prize at a show with them one year under the any thing goes section, it was five foot tall,

my unusual one this year was nasturums, ok but wont be in the ground this year coming tho

 

[Queens59]

I'll play - not sure whether I should plant up the allotment this year, as we are putting the bungalow on the market in Spring...but it could take a year to sell so I think in all probability I will....

 

[steve1958]

3 runner bean seeds
Ok, your on.

That gives me 6 days to read up on 'How to Grow'

 

[countryman]

pete can we soak before hand or not? (the beans that is)

 

[BeeJayBee]

I have to agree although be a while before it's frost-safe to stick 'em out.

I think the recommendation for beans is not to plant them out until night time temperatures are above 6 degree C, but I could be wrong.

 

[countryman]

i think pete means inside the house so temp outside dosnt matter

 

[dpearce4]

Count me in!!

I will do 2 sets one at home and one for the school.

 

[hedgerow pete]

i am doing mine inside, and as for soaking and such like, any thing goes.

its manly just for fun and because i am going stir crazy sat at home not gardening.

i have just been through all my seed packets and even worked out what i am going to order once i get some dollars and a job , which is either every sad or very efficient

 

[Headnavigator]

Yup, me too, I'll have a bash at it, would like to use my favourite Italian climbing 'French' bean, which is yellow. I won't win, but it'll make one more for you all to top, and makes great eating either young as runner or old for the beans themselves. That is if one can get it off the ground in the first place.

 

[dpearce4]

Just Planted my beans. French they were from the BBC digin programme.

has anyone else planted theirs yet?

 

[roche]

I think there may be others up to 14 hours ahead of us, but we've got some in...

 

[susbees]

Just Planted my beans. French they were from the BBC digin programme.

has anyone else planted theirs yet?

Good thinking....little one may have a pack of those. Not that I remember them from the great seed box tidy out. Still chuntering about not getting OA on - pouring again.

 

[roche]

How long do they take to shoot? Ours have been in a good three hours now, and still no sign....