Runner Beans

[mrs fish]

Thanks for the replys, I now have some tiny beans growing, I hope it is not too late in the season for them to grow big enough for dinner

[hallbg]

Originally Posted by mrs fish

How are peoples runner beans?
The flowers are not turning into beans for me, this is the first time this has happened, any ideas?

I am having the same problem here in Australia!
I water daily have had bumper crops previous years but this Dec/Jan Summer
lots of leaves and flowers both on dwarf & climbing beans but little crop
Brian

[Geoff F]

A bit late for the original question but hopefully this might be useful for 2010.

Last year I took part in a Gardening Which runner bean trial and found a new variety which gave me the best results ever. St. George is the name and it should be available from a few suppliers now.

Very attractive flowers which were similar to the old Painted Lady and a heavy crop of long tender juicy stringless beans. I only grew 6 plants and eventually became fed up with eating runners every day. 75% of trialist rated this variety as good overall.

I also see that there is a new hybrid cross between climbing French Beans and traditional Runner Beans which goes under the name of Moonlight. The beans look like runners but is self fertile like French Beans so should give good crops under difficult conditions when normal runners fail to set.

The write up is good, with 10 kg from 12 plants which start from mid July; but I haven't tried it myself. I always grow climbing French Beans for an early crop and they do well here in the far south.