Picked one up today at the local CoOp. I also got one of those little tiller/cultivators. Let's see now....so far this year, I've spent about $200 on fencing and another $160 on these two garden items.....all so I can grow "free" veggies!
<font color="blue"> Now youv'e got me dreaming of of a slab of warm fresh bread slathered with mayonaise and covered with a half inch thick slab of fresh picked sun warmed tomato and thinly sliced onion all garnished with some freshly chopped basil. </font color>
Sounds like a slice of summer heaven to me Egon....but you didn't mention the optional pepper and salt, which I like! [img]/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif[/img] Yum!
Well, I tried out my seeder yesterday right before the rains came, and now I'm in to the Zen of bean spacing.
I use some instructions I got from the university horticulture web site for most of my vegetable planting info. It gives reasonable dates for planting as well as normal spacing and seed requirement info. For beans, it says a three inch spacing between plants in the row should use a pound of seed per 100 ft row. I had decided to use Bird's double row method with the seeder, so I assumed I would use about a pound of seed or a little less for the double 50 ft row I was planting. I went through much less seed than that. Something between a quarter pound and a half pound. That made me worry that the seeder wasn't dropping beans all the time, but when I went back and dug around, I found beans about every place they should be....this of course also negated the benefit of the seeder, which was supposed to keep me from crawling around in the dirt. [img]/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif[/img] But then I noticed that on the back of the envelope my seed came in it also said one pound of seed for 100 ft of row, but specified 2-3 inch spacing! So....I just counted the seeds in a quarter pound pack and found 240. That gives 960 seeds per pound, which at a 2 inch spacing, or 6 seeds per foot, would do 160 feet! [img]/forums/images/icons/shocked.gif[/img] Maybe it is assumed that the 2 inch spacing will be thinned to 3 inches? Anyway, the bottom line is, I think the seeder worked as it was supposed to, and the double row probably makes sense because I have planted beans using a 2-3 inch spacing and they did fine, though the plants always seemed smaller than what I would have expected. With the larger spacing the seeder gives, a nominal 3.5 inches, even with a double row the plants should be less crowded and might develop better. We shall see. At any rate, I won't be down there crawling along carefully placing the individual seeds.
By the way, the seeds I counted are the Contender variety, though I would assume the more popular Blue Lake would give about the same number of seeds per pound. I plant Contender because it isn't Blue Lake. Most of the commercial canned beans seem to be Blue Lake, and though I know logically that home grown Blue Lake beans are not going to taste like canned Blue Lake, I still was turned off by the brand. Besides, I figure too much logic is like being too consistent: a sign of a weak mind! [img]/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif[/img]
Chuck, I usually bought a pound of seeds to did two double rows like you, but my rows were a little over 80 feet long, and I usually had a few seeds left over, but the Blue Lakes are by far my favorite. [img]/forums/images/icons/laugh.gif[/img]
Thanks for the numbers....looks like I should be able to do at least two more double 50's with the seed I have. One of these days I'll try the Blue Lake. As I said, too much consistency..... My best buddy only grows Blue Lake for bush beans, but I got him onto Kentucky Wonder pole beans and this year that's all he's growing. He's trying a neat idea: He makes arches with 16 foot cattle panels and is growing his tomatoes and pole beans on those. His wife is short enough to walk under the arches without stooping and he's hoping the novelty of that induces her to do most of the picking!
Chuck, my parents used to just plant pinto beans for green beans. I've eaten the Kentucky Wonders and I sure don't turn them down, just prefer the Blue Lakes, which is one of my favorite vegetables and Easter Sunday my wife fixed the last of the ones she canned last summer. [img]/forums/images/icons/frown.gif[/img] I haven't used any of the poles, trellises, etc. for climbing stuff of any kind except year before last, I had 4 extra tomato cages, so I used them to let the cucumber vines climb around on. [img]/forums/images/icons/grin.gif[/img]
>> That made me worry that the seeder wasn't dropping beans all the time
One thing you can do to check the seeder before going out in the garden is to run it a short distance in the garage or on a paved driveway and check how many seeds are dropped and the spacing. This can give you confidence before you go in the garden that the seeder is working properly.
I did that on the carpet in the living room. Sure imoressed the wife! Trouble is I'm one of those people who worry about stuff like this. One of the main reasons I got the seeder in the first place was because I would not just place the seed in a row, but would adjust the individual positions! I've got this sign on my chalkboard that says "Relax. Don't worry. Have a homebrew.", but if I followed that advice every time I get going on one of these trivial nagging doubts, they'd probably be planting me real soon! [img]/forums/images/icons/grin.gif[/img] I just about drive the wife crazy with such things. Can't wait to retire so I can really get her cranked up!
[img]/forums/images/icons/grin.gif[/img]
Bird,
I may plant some pintos to see what they taste like green. Do you remember?
Chuck, I liked the pinto beans OK several years ago, but don't know to describe the taste difference. I remember one year when Dad bought some pinto "seed" at the seed store (cost a lot more than the ones you buy in the grocery store) and he inquired and was told the ones in the grocery store "probably" wouldn't grow. So he planted a row of each to see. The ones from the grocery store did much better than the ones from the seed store. [img]/forums/images/icons/laugh.gif[/img]
My bean seed has been about $4.00/lb. Think how many rows of pintos you could plant for $4.00! Seems to me the wife bought several kinds of beans a while back for soup and didn't use all of any of them. I wish I had unlimited garden space to play with. Now that I'm more-or-less convinced the seeder does what it's supposed to do, I could trot back and forth a few times and have pintos, navy beans, black beans and who knows what else planted!
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote