Growing Commons

Tag: Beans

  • Planting staples 2025

    Planting staples 2025

    Sadly the tractor at Plotgate had serious engine problems and is out of action. We arranged to grow some rows of beans at Bridies Farm in Glastonbury. We planted 9 rows with a push seeder on the new raised beds made from soil and peat dug from new ditches. A lot different to the hard…

  • 2024 staple crops

    2024 staple crops

    Again we planted in tractor prepared beds at Plotgate using the push seeder. This year they were 30 meter rows. We planted 3 rows each of black and white quinoa, 1 rows each of purple queen beans and soy beans and 10 rows of borlotto beans. The soy beans and black quinoa failed to show.…

  • Harvest and processing 2023

    Harvest and processing 2023

    We harvested the crops by hand, for speed the whole bean plants were pulled. Seed heads were cut from all the other crops to avoid contaminating the smaller seed with soil, which would be difficult to separate out. There were so few lentil pods and the weak plants were totally swamped by the weeds which…

  • Growing staple crops

    Growing staple crops

    The soil of the first bed at Plotgate was ready for seeding towards the end of May so we planted out four 100 meter rows. Three quarters of their length was planted with borlotto bush beans, the last quarter with lentils. We also planted a few hundred beans in blocks as backup in case we…