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How to grow runner bean


How To Grow Runner Beans

Runner beans are delicious, nutritious and easy to grow. When picked young, they have great flavour, texture and succulence – so different to the stringy beans you find in the shops. They’re also pretty enough to grow as an annual climber in the flower border.

How to grow runner beans at home

To grow runner beans you need a good, moisture-retentive soil, bamboo canes or similar support, and some twine to tie the bamboo canes together. Plant seeds in pots, root-trainers or old toilet roll tubes in April for planting out in late May, or sow seed direct in the ground in May and early June.

Growing runner beans: jump links

More advice on growing runner beans:

How to grow runner beans from seed

How to grow runner beans - sowing runner beans

Runner beans need a sunny spot in rich, moisture-retentive soil with plenty of well-rotted compost or manure added. You can prepare the soil for planting in autumn or spring, it doesn't really matter. Dig the area thoroughly to remove weeds and add a generous amount of well-rotted garden compost or manure.

By sowing indoors in April, in deep pots, you'll get better germination and an earlier crop of beans. Sowing in pots first is also a good way to protect young plants from slugs and snails. Well-developed seedlings can be planted out after the last frost, usually around late May. You can make later sowings outside in May and June, but these won't start cropping until July or August.

If space is limited, grow runner beans in containers for an attractive and edible display – try 'Painted Lady', with its pretty red and white flowers.

When growing in pots, it's especially important to keep plants well watered. Choose as large a container as possible to help stop the compost drying out too quickly. Add a thick layer of mulch to the compost surface to hold in moisture, and on hot days move the pot out of direct sun if possible.

Where to buy runner beans online

How to care for your runner bean crop

How to grow runner beans - planting out runner beans

Runner beans need a strong support, such a wigwam. Use four or more canes, up to 3m long, and push the end of each one firmly into the soil in a circle, spacing them evenly. Tie all the tops of the canes together to form a wigwam. Then plant one runner bean at the base of each cane. As the plants grow, help them to get a good grip by tying new shoots to the canes.

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When your runner bean plants reach the tops of the canes, pinch out the growing tip of each one to encourage bushier growth. Beans are thirsty plants so water regularly, especially when in flower, and mulch the soil surface around the roots, to lock in moisture.

Growing runner beans: pests and diseases

Young runner bean plants are particularly susceptible to slugs. It's a good idea to grow more than you need, and then plant them out when they're as large as possible, to help them cope with any mollusc attacks. Use wildlife-friendly slug pellets, place copper rings around the stems of young plants or cover the soil with crushed eggshells or other similar dry, gritty material, to deter slugs and snails.

You may spot green shield bugs on your runner bean plants. These are harmless bugs and will not damage your crop.

Video: Why do my runner beans have white leaves?

Harvesting runner beans

How to grow runner beans - harvesting runner beans

Runner beans are ready to pick 12 to 16 weeks after sowing. The bean pods are at their most tender at 15-20cm long – any longer and they become stringy. Regular picking encourages the plants to produce more flowers, and therefore more young beans. Don't leave old beans on the plants as this will stop the plants flowering.

How to store runner beans

How to grow runner beans - storing runner beans

Runner beans freeze well. Top and tail them and remove any ‘string’. Slice beans into short lengths, blanch in boiling water for two minutes, drain, cool, pop into plastic bags and freeze.

How to prepare and use runner beans

Runner beans are delicious lightly steamed with a knob of butter. Cold, cooked beans are good in salads. Never eat them raw.

Advice on buying runner beans

Where to buy runner beans online

 

Great runner beans varieties to grow

How to grow runner beans - varieties to grow

How to Grow Runner Beans

, written by Ann Marie Hendry

We all know that beans are a musical fruit, or good for your heart, depending on which version of the rhyme you learned when you were a nipper, but in the UK at least no vegetable garden or allotment plot is complete without a wigwam foaming with scarlet-flowered runner beans.

The reason? Well, not only do they make a delectable vegetable, they are drop-dead gorgeous too.

Sowing and Growing Runner Beans

Runner beans were traditionally planted atop filled-in trenches dug the previous autumn and stocked with well-rotted manure or shredded newspaper. Kitchen waste will work too, because the main reason for doing this is to provide a deep, moist root run that will help runner beans to resist drought. Drought is a major enemy of beans, so avoid this at all costs.

Start sowing runner beans in spring and keep sowing every couple of weeks until early summer to spread out the harvest. Exactly when to sow will depend on your climate, so check out our Garden Planner for customized advice. The earliest seeds can be sown in modules or seed trays in a greenhouse, tunnel or on a sunny windowsill for transplanting later on.

Runner beans dislike cold soil, so wait until the soil has warmed to at least 10ºC (50ºF) before planting them out. You can warm soil a week or so in advance of sowing or planting using cold frames, cloches, row cover tunnels or even just sheets of plastic.

Later sowings can be made directly where they are to grow, but beware of hungry slugs and make sure to protect seedlings from wind damage. Covering them with a cloche (even a recycled plastic bottle will do) will provide all the shelter they need until they establish.

In cool or windy locations you can protect plants and boost pod production by growing them to maturity in a greenhouse or tunnel – just make sure to ‘stop’ the plants, or pinch out the growing tips, when they near the roof.

While closely-related French beans are self-pollinating, runners need help from pollinators such as bees and hummingbirds, so yields will be hampered by a wet, cold summer when insects are unlikely to be flying. A dry summer is bad news too, so make sure to water during rainless spells and mulch to preserve that moisture.

Beans are usually pretty trouble-free, but keep an eye out for black bean aphids infesting the growing tips. If this happens, clip off the tips and dispose of them.

Supporting Runner Beans

Get supports in place before planting your runners. Any frames or trellis need to be sturdy enough to support these lanky beans, which grow to well in excess of 2m (6.5 feet) tall and which will become extremely heavy when laden with pods. Netting is often used along with canes or poles to allow the vines to clamber about freely.

Bean wigwams look just as attractive in the flower garden as they do in the vegetable garden. Runner beans were originally grown purely as ornamental plants, so you can find exciting flower color choices such as ‘Scarlet Runner’ or the ravishing red-lipped white flowers of ‘Painted Lady’.

You may need to tie young plants in to their supports initially, but once they’ve got a grip they should manage on their own. If they’re catching the wind they may need to be tied in at intervals.

When the plants reach the top of their supports, pinch out their growing tips to help divert energy into flower and pod production – and to avoid the plants turning into a jungle of tangled stems and foliage.

Such tall, leafy plants will cast shade, so plan your garden to include shade-loving crops behind your towering beanstalks.

Harvesting Runner Beans

Keeping up with weeding, watering and mulching is important while the beans are growing. Apply an occasional liquid feed too. Harvesting will commence around midsummer and continue until the first frosts. Runner beans will crop slightly later than French beans, so for variety and to extend the season it can be worth growing both.

Pick your beans while they’re still quite small to avoid any stringiness, though having said that modern cultivars are usually bred to be stringless. Pick at least every other day, because you’ll be astounded at how rapidly a bean pod can grow – they seem to go from flat to fat in the blink of an eye!

If you’re going to be away during the summer, invite friends and neighbors to help themselves to your beans to encourage continued cropping for when you return. Alternatively you could use the break as an opportunity to switch from producing fresh pods to maturing beans for drying. Gluts of the whole fresh pods can be chopped, blanched if you wish (I never do, I can’t tell the difference!) then frozen.

Beautiful, productive, and delicious – what more could a vegetable gardener ask for? Share your runner bean growing tips or favorite varieties with us in the comments section below.

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How to grow green beans - Summer advice

Green, French, asparagus, green beans ... as soon as our gardeners do not call this tender beans. Many of us adore this mega-healthy vegetable, grow it easily, naturally and with pleasure, managing to collect unprecedented harvests from several bushes. And someone does not give beans at all. It seems that they are planting and watering, but as a result, disappointment: again something has grown that does not look a bit like green beans.

How to grow green beans without complaining about the harvest? We reveal all the secrets of growing truly wonderful pods!

String beans

String beans come in several varieties: green, yellow, purple, white with purple streaks, sometimes even with pink pods. But for us, gardeners, it is much more important that green beans are divided into curly and bush.

Both bush and climbing beans have their advantages and disadvantages. So, for example, bush beans are less thermophilic than curly beans, do not require support and, as a rule, give the crop together (it is harvested in 2-3 doses). But curly beans give more pods, due to constant growth, it grows up, so it can take free space between other plants, it can be planted along the fence (or instead of it) as a hedge.

We advise you to plant several plants of each type as a test in order to decide which one is easier for you to take care of, which one will be more productive, etc. The only thing is that for the northern regions it is better to choose early-ripening varieties that begin to bear fruit two months after planting. Summer residents of the southern regions can afford late varieties.

Planting green beans

Green beans are heat-loving crops, so they are planted quite late when the ground warms up well and frosts are no longer expected. Usually planting is done in late May - early June.

String bean is a thermophilic crop, so it is best grown in sandy soils. This is especially true of the northern regions, where in cold summers, green beans may not produce pods at all. So we add sand to the beds, place them in a well-heated place or build a warm bed for the beans.

String beans are a heat-loving crop, so a couple of weeks before planting, it is recommended to cover the bed with foil to warm the ground. If you want to plant your beans in a warm bed (which is exactly what you need), soak them with an EM solution and then cover with foil. In well-warmed soil, beans will sprout earlier.

String bean seeds must be soaked before planting. At least - for two hours, as a maximum - before the appearance of seedlings. Beans planted with germinated seeds will sprout quickly and amicably.

The bed is laid out according to the scheme: 8-10 centimeters between bushes, 30-40 centimeters between rows. For curly beans, you can increase these distances and immediately put the supports. Green beans are planted two seeds in one hole, then to choose the strongest plant. The optimum sowing depth is 3 cm.

After planting, the bed is watered and mulched with humus, straw or grass. Do not be afraid to mulch the beans (many worry that the soil warms up more slowly under the mulch), we warmed up the bed well beforehand, and the mulch perfectly retains the moisture vital for seed germination. If you are not a fan of mulching, you need to ensure that the bed is always damp (but not overflowing).

In two weeks (maybe earlier) the first shoots of green beans will appear.

String bean care

String beans or green beans do not require special care. It is not even necessary to feed it, especially when grown in warm beds under organic mulch. The only thing that this plant desperately needs is heat. We repeat and remember once again: green beans are a thermophilic culture. It grows best at a temperature of + 20-25 ° C.

So, as the seedlings grow, we choose the strongest ones, and pinch their neighbors under the root (no need to pull out, why disturb the root system once again?). For those who do not want to mulch, it would be nice to spud the beans when the bushes grow up to ten centimeters in order to create all the conditions for the development of the roots.

In the future, we are required to provide the plants with moisture either through regular heavy watering, or through mulching and watering during especially hot periods. A couple of times during the season, you can water the beans with infusion of ash.

When the curly beans reach two meters in height, boldly pinch the top to stop the growth of the stem and direct all the juices to fruit set.

Harvest of green beans

Harvesting of green beans must never be delayed. As soon as the beans are finally formed and ripened in the pods, the bush will stop developing. When the plants are "sure" that they have produced seeds for procreation, they stop growing. Our task is to track the appearance of pods. Yeah, we started ... in a week we are harvesting the first crop. The more often you cut the pods, the more ovaries the bush will give out. Therefore, after 4-6 days, we again examine the plants - most likely, we again have something to collect.

By the way, the best time to harvest green beans is on a cool morning. This way the blades stay fresh longer. String beans are usually stored frozen. Immediately after harvest, the pods are cut into several pieces, placed in bags and placed in the freezer until winter.

When the freezer is full and the lobio for lunch is completely tired, you can leave the last bean pods hanging until full maturity and take seeds from them for the next year.

We wish you success and great harvests!

How to plant and care for string beans for a rich harvest

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When to plant green beans

This plant loves heat, so the soil should warm up to 12–15 °C, and the air should warm up to 15–17 °C. Sowing beans in the ground before the second half of May does not make sense: the seeds will simply sit in the ground and wait for suitable conditions for growth. However, you can harvest a good harvest, and if you plant a vegetable even in July.

How to choose green bean seeds

Bush beans grow compactly and do not require support, unlike climbing beans. The lashes of the latter are capable of becoming a dense hedge. Due to the size of the plant, the climbing crop will be much larger than the bush.

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String beans. Frame: In the countryside and in the city Tatyana Malyuga / YouTube

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Curly green beans. Frame: Garden soul / YouTube

Beans ripen from 50 to 100 days from the moment of germination. Early varieties are ready for harvesting in 1.5–2 months, late varieties in 3–4.

Pods may vary in length and color. They are white, yellow, green and dark purple.

How to prepare a bed for growing green beans

Find a sunny and wind-sheltered spot. A place along a fence or railing is perfect - in the future they will become support for climbing beans, and you do not have to make special supports.

2 weeks before sowing, apply 1 tablespoon of superphosphate and azofoska, 3 kg of compost and 1 cup of wood ash to each square meter of bed. Dig up the soil onto the bayonet of a shovel and level the surface with a rake.

How to plant green beans

Sowing this vegetable is not difficult.

Soak the seeds

To speed up germination and disinfect the seeds, place them in a solution of potassium permanganate - you need to take 0.5 g of the product per 100 ml of warm water. After a day, discard the floating beans: they are dry or empty inside. Those that remain at the bottom are ready for sowing.

Make holes

A depth of 4-5 cm is enough. For climbing beans, make holes at a distance of 60 cm, for bush beans - 40 cm. If you are sowing in several rows, the distance between them should be 20-30 cm.

Plant beans

Image: GardenGuide / YouTube

Pour plenty of water over the holes and wait until it is absorbed. Put two beans in each and cover them with soil.

Place a support

If you have planted the beans along a fence or other structure that they will climb over, skip this step. The bush form does not need support at all.

In other cases, it is enough to drive in two pegs at least 2 m high along the edges of the row and stretch the net between them. You can buy a special one for climbing plants, or use building grates made of metal and plastic.

Photo: Berna Namoglu / Shutterstock

Another way is to drive sticks at least 2 m high near each hole and wrap beans around them in the future.

Wait for germination

Seeds may take 1-2 weeks to germinate. The warmer the soil and air, the faster shoots will appear. If two beans hatch at once from the hole, carefully pull out the weaker sprout.

How to care for green beans

Just a few steps to a great harvest.

Mulch beds

Shot: Alenin's garden / YouTube

This will protect the soil from drying out and hold back the growth of weeds. Pour peat, sawdust or straw around the bushes with a layer of 5–10 cm. Freshly cut grass is also suitable, which during the composting process will generate heat and additionally warm the soil. But you need to be more careful with it: when mulching, step back 3–5 cm from the stem of the plant, otherwise the rotting mass can burn it.

Water the beans

The soil in the garden should always be moderately moist, so water the plants under the root as needed. One bush needs 1-2 liters of water, and as soon as the fruits begin to set, the rate can be increased to 3 liters.

Feed the beans

Only do this once when the buds start to form. For each square meter of beds, take 15 g of superphosphate and 50 g of wood ash. Sprinkle fertilizer around the plants, gently loosen the soil, and water the beans.

Weed the beds

Do this regularly. Weeds develop very quickly and in the process of growth they take nutrients from the soil.

When and how to harvest green beans

Photo: DGSHUT / Shutterstock

On average, pods mature in 10 days from the moment they are set.

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