I am sorry I contaminated this thread (runner beans) with my pole beans . I though they were equivalent (pole = runner) but jesse just mentionnend that runner states for coccineus only, not for all climbers.
Ha ha, no need to apologize. Itâs not contamination â itâs cross-pollination! 
Really, in all seriousness, if you grow both species together and donât differentiate between them, it makes sense to talk about them together, too. You never know â you may end up with interspecies crosses. That would be neat!
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Thanks for that Julia,it looks pretty obvious now you have pointed it out to me!
I wouldnt say that they are unproductive,the white Runners tend to go on abit with many of them still in flower and very short pods.
I think once im happy about the diversity (probably next year) I will start to look more at yield and ability to finish earlier and how to deal with growing them so tall in a windy area.Apart from that they are the easiest crop to grow here creating great shade for salad crops if you happen to live in a hot spot.
Ive got to say that the demi sec seeds where the pods are yellow and just starting to dry out are the most amazing beans I have ever tasted very creamy with the coloured beans having a rich beany flavour not in the whites.
Anyway here are a few pics,will send some more when I can,
Happy harvestingâŚKIevin D
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Just stumpled on this video, experimenting with perennial runner beans
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Thatâs a very interesting video, but itâs hard to know what to do with the information as heâs missing controls. He admitted that he doesnât normally grow these under plastic, so we donât know how that affected growing, throwing into question all of his comparisons with previous growing. And, he didnât plant seedlings early in the same year he replanted these rhizomes so that he could compare relative changes in productivity to see if they were cultural or inherent.
So, itâs an interesting anecdote, but it doesnât vary at all from my experience, for instance, where I only get beans early in the season and very late, entirely from seedlings. I have no way to know if this is unrelated coincidence, or the result of similar factors.
In the GTS Landrace course, thereâs a video that demonstrates how to make a manual cross (they demontrate peas but bean flowers are nearly identical in structure). You might try that if you are interested in crossing the runners. Yes it is a bit fussy but also not rocket science. The genetic benefit might be substantial.
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If you have a vole problem: owls, foxes, badgers, skunks, coyotes and gopher snakes are your best friends. A coyote saved my camas patch from voles one winter. Vole overpopulation is a symptom of absent predators.
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Youâre preaching to the choir! We donât do anything to discourage predators but we wonât do anything to encourage them either.
This season weâve fenced off the main growing areas. There are a number of benefits to this. The fencing wonât deter terrestrial predators from coming round any more than the existing fencing, but one probable consequence is the dogs wonât discourage them as much.
Our goal is abundant food within an ecosystem-integrated growing system. Minimal disturbance and no pest management
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