(11/16) Easy-to-Grow, Nutritious, and More American than Apple Pie

For the past two autumns I delved into some of the history behind two of our native food crops: two cucurbits – pumpkins and squash – and corn. This year, it will be beans, completing a sampling of the Three Sisters, the companion planting scheme developed by the Indigenous peoples of the Americas.

Anyone who spends time shopping for, preparing and/or eating legumes might think that ‘beans’ aren’t necessarily American. There are lentils and chickpeas used in Eastern Mediterranean and lentils in South Asia, as well as soybeans in East Asia. But the bean species from the Americas – the common bean, snap bean, green bean, shelly bean – is Phaseolus vulgaris. (Lentils are Lens culinaris, Chick peas are Cicer arietinum, and Soybeans are Glycine max.) They are all members of the botanical family called Fabaceae; they are all legumes.

The species I am writing about, the common bean, is American, and it appears that the origin of all common beans is Mesoamerica. Once the Incas in Peru got a hold of the beans through the trading networks of the day, they bred them, developing cultivars that thrived in the Andes and complemented their own preferences.

As the beans traveled into the Southwest, the Indigenous population found these protein-rich vegetables valuable. Their breeding gave rise to several varieties which were soon traded north into temperate area of Canada and east to the Atlantic Coast. As Europeans explorers – Spanish, French, English, and Dutch – encountered various Indigenous populations in their travels, they were gifted with samples of beans, corn, squash and pumpkin seeds, which they sent back to Europe. In Europe, local breeding projects focusing on the pods developed beans with smaller, sometimes thinner pods, and more tender pods. The tough ‘string’ was largely eliminated, too. Trading continued across east Europe, as well as west again, to the American colonies.

The first colonial settlers in Massachusetts began growing the corn, beans, squash and pumpkins from seeds they received from the Indigenous peoples they encountered. They also learned about the Three Sisters agricultural methods. It wasn’t too long before the English reverted to planting each crop in separate rows and each row in its place. Still, they successfully grew the three staples and they also started developing their own cultivars. Besides the food value of beans – they are rich in protein, folate, iron, potassium, magnesium and fiber – they taste good and they are fairly trouble-free to grow. It’s no wonder they were a staple food for folks who had little else.

Beans are one of the easiest garden vegetables to grow. It is a great vegetable to start children on their path to gardening. The seeds are large, making them easy to plant. Once the bean plants produce beans, your youngster can be encouraged to sample right from the plant. What a treat! What a sense of accomplishment!

Bean seeds can go into the ground when the soil is warm, or as old timers would tell you, when the oak leaves are the size of a squirrel’s ears. If beans are planted into cold ground, or it gets cold again before they emerge, they could rot in the soil. Beans aren’t frost hardy, either. Our ground has been getting warm enough to sprout beans before the last average frost day, but the gardener who wants to rush the season should be ready with protection if necessary.

A unique feature shared by all beans is that they are nitrogen-fixers, that is, they take nitrogen from the air and turn it into the nitrogen chemicals the plant needs to live. Self-fertilizing! Not so fast . . . They can’t do it alone. Legumes and a few non-legume plants can form relationships with nitrogen-fixing prokaryotes (Prokaryotes are cells without nuclei; not all prokaryotes are bacteria).

Rhizobium bacteria, the prokaryotes that form a relationship with beans, are attracted to chemicals released by the bean roots. Once the Rhizobium finds the root and moves into it, colonies, or nodules, are formed. The Rhizobium now turns nitrogen from the air into ammonia, a molecule the plant immediately turns into a form it needs and sends it to the aboveground part of the plant. From that point the plant synthesizes nitrogen-containing chemicals (including chlorophyll), and the sucrose produced by the plant is shared with the symbiotic Rhizobium living in the roots.

An important point for the grower of legumes is that there are several species of nitrogen-fixing prokaryotes, and each species of legume forms a relationship with a specific bacterium. Most general-purpose inoculants sold to home gardeners contain the several Rhizobium species, making life easier, but farmers often buy a specific bacteria inoculant for each legume planted.

What kind of beans to plant? There are so many! What do you want? Early harvest, long steady harvest? Green, wax, or purple beans? Small and exceptionally tender? Bush, trellised or half-runner? A good bean for eating fresh, freezing, or canning? WOW! The choices! The history of beans in North America includes the development of many different bean varieties, each adapted to the site conditions and needs of the people growing them. One resource I found mentioned there are 485 different heirloom varieties in Appalachia alone. A common thread in the stories of most of the beans mentioned is that of being passed down through a family for generations.

A group of Master Gardeners is currently growing and saving seed, this year from tomatoes, hoping to find a variety adapted to Adams County. But we all can save seeds, especially bean seeds. Beans can self-fertilize, meaning they will produce a fruit/bean, without the help of a pollinator. But those industrious bees don’t waste the nectar in a bean flower! Bees can cross pollinate beans if you grow more than one variety.

If you only grow one variety and you like them enough to grow them again, find a few plants that are the most vigorous, produce the tastiest beans, are disease and insect resistant and have other traits you like. Let some pods mature until they are dry and easily break open with a squeeze. Save the bean seeds in a marked envelope and plant them next year, perhaps alongside plants from fresh seeds of the same variety. In a generation, you’ll have your own locally adapted heirloom bean. What will you name it?

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