Beans update

2 weeks after sowing the seeds for 2 new families of beans, the plants have made quite good progress since. and thankfully, no sign of the furry bugs.

The unknown white beans are relatively easy to grow. their germination success rate is much higher than red beans, and the time taken to reach stability (rooted into the soil) is also much less. apparently once the plant is firmly rooted, it will survive to adulthood, unless diseased or desecrated. so that means out of an equal number of red beans and white beans cultured, the number of white beans that wil survive to adulthood is about triple of red beans.

I am growing 11 white bean plants. 9 in one big container, another 1 mistakenly planted with the red beans, and the other alone in a small container, placed in direct sunlight. the mix-up occured cos i cultured the red n white beans together. and somehow after shooting, some white bean's coats become a deceptive red color, same as red beans. so i was at first pleased i had a red bean growing so much faster than its 'fellow red beans', and the truth was soon revealed. i also have 5 true red bean plants, sharing a container with the outsider.

The white bean plants are green in colour. they have a thick stem and broad leaves. the first pair are dark green and waxy. no veins on upper surface. as for subsequent sets, leaves are almond shaped, lighter green and more delicate; veins can be seen clearly. similar to green bean and red bean plants, they comes in sets of 3.

Red bean plants are also green. compared to the white beans, they have a much longer (longer than green beans also) and thinner stem, and smaller roots. altogether this makes it much more fragile. they are unable to stand upright like the white bean plants. once a strong wind blows, they will lean backwards, so they are left in that position. cotyledons are held at the base near the roots and doesnt split, unlike white and green bean's, which are held at middle of stem and splits apart. 1st pair of leaves are dark green, shows veins, slightly rough texture bigger than green bean's. subsequent sets are lighter green, slightly waxy. Whats special about red bean leaves is that the 1st pair are nicely heart shaped. could be used on valentines day! haha. but only the 1st pair. the others are of a very different shape.

the white beans shot up at first, leaving the red beans far behind in growth. by the time they spread their broad leaves, the red beans were still just small shoots, some even still trying to take root. then the 2nd sets were emerging while the red beans just opened their small hearty leaves. but from then the red beans sprang up fast, overtaking the white beans. after not seeing one of them for 2 days, it grew from having a small 1st set to full sized 1st set and 2nd set opened. right now, all the white beans have their 2nd set fully dveloped, and some are just starting to grow 3rd sets, while 4 red beans have 2nd sets almost fully developed, and 2 have 3rd sets alr coming up.

both the species are rather different and uniquely interesting. now its a race between them to developing pods! from what i see, both species have fairly good chance of winning. its about stability vs haste.

The last bean (part 3)

Generation 3

Just like before, gen3 had a special significance as it carried on the bloodline of my past 2 gens of beans, and the sense of achievement of sucessfully raised 2 generations of bean plants which produced much fruit.

But that was not to go on much longer. Gen 3 grew rather slowly. it also acquired some terrible condition where its leaves were very loosely atached to the stalks, so it fell off easily. it stopped growing at a smaller size, but flowered at the same time - 2.5 months. all the fruits came around the same time, and they were not many. it hardly produced any more fruit after its first season.

soon after, all its leaves started to develop a rough texture and darker green color. this also happened for gen1 and 2, but only much later in life. this means gen3 aged early. this time there was also a purplish tint... looks like diseased. not long after, a lot of its leaves had dropped, forming a litter of decomposing leaves below.

Gen 3 died even before it turned 4 months old, just shortly after the death of their parents which were definitely much healthier. gen3 left behind just bare stalks with few leaves, in different positions and leaning in diffren directions. rather unsightly. while gen2 still looked good after death. it had some leaves, lots of pod stalks to tell of its fruitful history, and even some unbloomed flowers.

There were only enough gen4 beans to grow in 1 small container. not enough to carry on with the usual 2. i gave a spare pod to Claudia as part of her bd present, with hope that she would carry on the bloodline somehwere else, away from the whatever bugs and diseases. but she delayed a month, then just buried the pod in a pot of soil... and nothing came up from it.

Gen 4 in its growing days.

Generation 4

Even greater uniformity this time, like clones. and they fared yet worse than gen3. they stopped growing after 4 sets of leaves. usually flowers come only after 5 sets are up. a few of them bore fruit. but infant mortality rate was high - alot of them dropped before fully developing. in the end, there were only a pathetic 3 pods, and each contained a pathetic 1 seed each.

Age then catched up on them real soon and its leaves all shed like its parents, even thouh they did not have the fragile leaf condition. also by before 4 months old, they were totally barren. i figured theres no point keeping them, so i didnt water them and they turned into dry brown stems. even the branches fell off. at least they looked better than gen3 cos they were all same height, straight, and slightly leaning in the same direction. there were unbloomed flowers on some of them.

I gave up hope on those 3 gen5 beans. i doubted their survival and progress. i kept them in my room and one day they just... disappeared.

so this is the approximate harvest of beans from each generation.
Gen 1 - 60
Gen 2 - 105
Gen 3 - 20
Gen 4 - 3

So this is all thats left of my bean family. dried plants that i still look at in remembrance of them. too bad i pulled out the gen1 plants after each of them died. so no momento.

i still have no good answer as to why there was the drastic deprovement between gen 2 and 3. well maybe it really is what despick suggested - changes in soil quality over the seasons. NOT overcrowding cos gen2 was more crowded than gen3. but theres a pattern - increased uniformity in each successive gen. maybe theres not enough genetic variation, so the quality deproves.. sth lidat, cos cross breeding is supposedly to result in better offspring. this problem could be due to me growing only the first few beans of which some would come from same pod, or same plant.

Ah well... the green bean family is now history. But i have recently started another 2 families of beans. theres red beans and some unknown bean. same color as soya bean. and the unknown bean is doing much better than the red beans. i shall see how they would progress.

The last bean (part 2)

Generation 2

getting to grow beans which are offspring of my homegrown plants feels very different from growing beans from a packet purchased off NTUC. its like your own pet dog giving birth to puppies vs getting new puppies from the pet shop. the gen2 beans carries on the bloodline of gen1.

since the gen2 plants were grown on 1st come 1st serve basis, only the earliest pods of gen1 were sent for cultivation. my logic is that the strongest plants grew pods fastest, so i would want to carry on those good genes. just like i hoped those 7 first beans would grow up to be like Champion.

gen2 did not grow up to be like their parents. in fact, all the gen2 plants were rather plain and similar even though they came from different parents. i did not see anyhing like the variations and unique features among gen1. but still, gen 2 was much more prosperous than gen1.

gen 2 in its prosperity

at its fruiting season, multiple pods were seen among the leaves. i counted, at one time, there were 14 pods altg, big and small. that excludes another 6 from gen1.
i was delighted to see 3 record-breaking pods all coming at the same time, on 3 different plants. not champion's children. 1 of them contained 8 seeds and the oher 2 had 9. other than the 7-seed pod in gen1, the rest of the pods before n after that only had 1 - 4 seeds.

the 3 big pods

when gen2 was nearing adulthood, all of the plants including gen1 were suddenly invaded by some white furry soft bodied bugs. they spawned real fast and abundantly and sucked my plant's juices. their orange color eggs were laid inside a weave of cottonlike web. i had to spend time everyday getting rid of them. everyday there will be new ones. there was a time after i let them grow a bit, i collected a whole bunch of the bugs, put them together, then executed them by squishing them all into a ball of guts. they were rather juicy.

3 generations of plants

just as before, the first fruits of gen2 were used to grow gen3. this time gen3 was grown in 1 big container, allowing more space per plant. gen2 continued to fruit till about 5 months old.

so there was 3 generations living under one roof. one happy family.

The last bean (part 1)

Today i shall officially announce the extinction of my homegrown green bean plants. its really sad and unexpected from the start. i thought it could continue on forever. until i lose track which generation a certain batch is from. i still do not know why it turned out this way. very strange.

Generation 1

It all started in july last year. we were doing bio practicals using green bean plants. we were given some beans to grow in different conditions. the teacher showed us some samples of young bean plants and it sparked interest in me to grow some for myself, until they reach adulthood and produce more beans. i knew they grew fast and simply, easy to grow. so i pocketed some of the beans i was given, and brought them home to raise as my own.

I first had them germinated in a nursery and picked out the healthiest plants, enough to fill 2 containers. Using plastic containers filled with fertilised soil stolen from the estate vegetation and a covering layer of cotton, i transfered the saplings over and there they stayed for the rest of their life.

Gen 1 in its younger days

Being the first time seriously growing a whole batch of bean plants, i was excited watching them grow. I visited them everyday and kept track of every plant's progress. it was quite a lot of time spent with them, averaging half an hour. some of them was rather unique so i knew them individually and even gave them names. some of the characters i remember

*Champion plant - the fastest growing and most promising of them all. its progress was very obviously outstanding. it had a unique split near the base of the stem so it appeared like it had 2 stems that merged above, creating a much thicker stem than the rest. it produced the first fruits of the batch, which ripened even before any other plants started growing fruits. the first fruit contained 7 seeds - the record for the 1st gen. at the peak of its growth, it had enormous leaves, the biggest 1 about 4 times the size of its baby leaf. this feature was never to be seen again in the following generations.

*Sunken colony - also quite a fast grower but didnt grow to champ's size. the special feature is that its main root forms an arch above ground and roots in a spot without cotton cover. (normal plants just roots where it is and penetrates the cotton cover. the main root is underground.) because of its improper foundation, it was unable to stand upright.

*mangrove - when it was young, its main root was on the ground, then it spawned many side roots that actually held it above ground, like a kampong on stilts. upon growing bigger, it became too eavy for the roots to support, so it collapsed and ended up in a weird posture. but survived to bear fruit.

*surgery patient - its stem somehow got damaged. dont know how. it was bent like someone with a broken spine. so i gave it super glue, trying to make it straighten up. from then on it had the artificial stem portion to hold it up. and then sth weird happened... it started to grow small roots at the glued area! but didnt grow long.

*solar panel - a really interesting plant. for a very long time, it remained as a small plant with just the 2 baby leaves. those leaves were a special dark green. it stayed stagnant like that but didnt die, so it resembled a solar panel, just absorbing sunlight and making energy.
Then one day... it finally started to grow new leaves, but 2 sets at a time! (this is abnormal.) those 2 sets were on separate branches which grew out of between the baby leaves. and these 2 branches later produced another set of leaves each, also at the same time. i could rename it twinheaded plant.

*singlerooter - this plant's main root never submerged. instead it just grew 1 side root to support and supply for the whole plant. so of course it was slow in growth. btw theres a scientific term for side root. i forgot...

And so the beans produced were used on first come first serve basis into planting the 2nd generation of plants, up to another 2 containers. so of course the first 7 gen2 plants came from that first fruit by champion plant. the average time for the plants to fruit is 3 months

Gen 1 in its dying days

Gen 1 continued to be fertile even at old age. Even when gen2 had already started to fruit, gen1 was still spawning pods. its like... when the children already have their own families, their parents are still giving them newborn siblings.
the average time from germination to fruiting is 3 months, and average lifespan is 6 months. so green bean plants dont live to be great ah mas.