Runner Beans.

Plashing

I am wondering how many of you are still harvesting runner beans,mine are still coming in fact I am having a better yield now than I were having at the end of August and September,they taste better and are longer, less stingy,and they are still coming I am just hoping that we don't get any frosts in the next week or two.

steephill

This afternoon I watched a pair of jays helping themselves to the last of mine which I was letting run to seed.

nick615

Ours ended 3-4 weeks ago (Co Cork) but they had suffered significant wind damage.  Seed has been drying in the airing cupboard for a couple of weeks.

garynortheast

Yep, still harvesting my Scarlet Emperor runners. Only just recently picked the last of my Blauhilde, purple podded, climbing French beans too. My freezer is now completely full with runners and French beans.

TriciaB

Ours were overrun with blackfly in the summer but finally started to produce enough to be worth picking about a month ago. I just picked enough for a meal today but that's more or less the end. Any crop at all has been a bonus. In desperation I had planted dwarf green bean plants at the end of July and amazingly they have given a good crop. Another bonus!

Mark-E

Still just about harvesting our Scarlet Emperor in Pontypridd, Wales. They seem to be coming to an end now. Good yield this year.

bédé

I am still learning to navigate this forum.  I couln't find anything more recent on runner beans than Oct 2020.  Mainly talk then was about the end of the season.

My question is: when does the season start?  I have not grown them for several years but expected to have been cropping by now.

Sowed Scarlet Empeor end May, planted out early June.  Very hot .  I did water.
July very wet weather.  No flowers until August.
Now lots of flowers at the top, above 2m, but not setting well.  A very few ca 1-2in only.  I've not seen many pollinators at the beans, though lots on the flowers in a diifferent part of the garden.

Dovefromabove

We’ve been picking for about 3 weeks now. A really heavy crop this year … so far the best ever in this garden (10 years)

Very lush foliage and we’ve hardly watered, but we do prepare the site very well each year with a pit or trench of half-rotted material from the compost heaps. 

We’re growing Moonlight … a runner x French bean … all the flavour and size of runners but with the French bean’s ability to self-pollinate. 

BobTheGardener

Picking for about 3 weeks here too.  Growing White Lady and the crops are huge and on very vigorous plants this year.  Delicious, completely stringless pods, even when left on the plants a bit too long - one of the few varieties I've grown which actually are stringless!   I might have finally found the right variety for me, yippee! 

steephill

Your sowing was a little late perhaps but don't worry, you will soon have a glut like every other runner bean grower. I sowed at the beginning of May and have been harvesting for a couple of weeks. Also on acid greensand near the Surrey Hills, north facing site.

Nanny Beach

I've been growing polestar for quite a few years, couldn't find the seeds this year,the ones I sowed were collected in 2017, been picking about a month good yeald. Usually dreadful blackfly think they were enjoying the broad beans this year. Grew cobra climbing French beans, for the first time, fantastic yeald and not all the faff,so probably won't bother with runners anymore