Whatever time of year you go out for a meal, there seem to be French beans on the plate somewhere, so let\u2019s try and grow our own.\u00a0 They originated in South America, and need as much warmth as the English climate allows.<\/p>\n
Seeds and plants like it warm and moist, the soil really has to be at full summer heat for them to flourish.\u00a0 Transplanting in late May or early June is best, as they grow away strongly and shrug off the slugs.<\/p>\n
For a good start it makes sense to sow the seeds 2\u201d deep in a 3\u201d deep container or module tray in a greenhouse, and transplant 3 weeks later.\u00a0 Since we have had a polytunnel we do one earlier sowing in mid March and pick beans by June, with a much heavier crop in the extra heat.\u00a0 If the soil is dry at flowering time, moisten the soil to encourage set of fruit.<\/p>\n
A big decision is whether to plant dwarf or climbing varieties.\u00a0 Dwarfs need no support and crop a week earlier than climbers, although their pods can get soiled and nibbled by slugs.\u00a0 15-18\u201d spacing in full sun is best. As with all types of bean, close spacing gives you plenty of leaf but less fruit.\u00a0 Tendergreen is a favourite and also Sonesta, whose yellow beans are easier to see, although all French beans go green when cooked.<\/p>\n
Picking pods when small will help keep the plant flowering, but the second crop on dwarfs is smaller and more erratic in quality.\u00a0 A second sowing in June to early July will give another crop in September to October.<\/p>\n
Climbing varieties are a pleasing spectacle in the garden, easier to pick and crop for much longer.\u00a0 We grow them up circular 8\u2019 bamboo wigwams\u00a0 and empty a bucket of manure in the middle to feed and keep the soil moist.\u00a0 Cobra is our favourite, long harvests and long beans.<\/p>\n
An interesting climbing variety is Borlotto, which you can pick normally, or leave to ripen as haricot beans inside the pods.\u00a0 The pods ripen to a beautiful striped yellow and red, and you can eat the haricots fresh or dry them for winter use.\u00a0 Last year we had 1.3 kg of dried beans off 10 plants sown on 15 May and grown up a 4 foot diameter wigwam.<\/p>\n
It is easy to keep your own seed as for some reason these beans rarely cross pollinate, even at a close distance.\u00a0 And when is the moon not hungry?\u00a0 When it\u2019s full.<\/p>\n
What to sow in May:<\/p>\n
Virtually all summer crops can be sown this month if you haven\u2019t already, although it is risky to plant out heat lovers like courgette and French beans until late in the month.\u00a0 Also winter cabbage and purple sprouting and second crops of lettuce and beetroot.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Whatever time of year you go out for a meal, there seem to be French beans on the plate somewhere, so let\u2019s try and grow our own.\u00a0 They originated in South America, and need as much warmth as the English climate allows. Seeds and plants like it warm and moist, the soil really has to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"cybocfi_hide_featured_image":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[20],"class_list":["post-2741","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-gardening","tag-fergus-dowding"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.marshwoodlife.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2741","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.marshwoodlife.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.marshwoodlife.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.marshwoodlife.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.marshwoodlife.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2741"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.marshwoodlife.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2741\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.marshwoodlife.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2741"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.marshwoodlife.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2741"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.marshwoodlife.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2741"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}