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Dog Beans

Dog Beans

I had a pretty good crop of Dog Beans this year.  We had several large servings of the green beans, and I guess I ended up with a kilo or two of dried beans.  This is really a good tasting bean, both dried and green, and the plants are among the most prolific of any bean I have ever seen.

If you want to see something strange, have a look at Jardim con Gatos, he grew exactly the same beans (I sent him some of my seeds), but in his garden the colors reversed.  Where my beans are red, his are white, and vis-versa.  I’ve never seen a color reversal in these beans before (but this is common in some other beans).  He also didn’t get any beans with the same color pattern as mine.

I’ve been growing these off and on for a couple of years now, and honestly I’ve never noticed any germination problems.  That is until now.  It’s possible I’ve just gone back and planted some more seeds when I noticed seeds weren’t germinating, because I do this with beans sometimes.

Before starting the year I germination tested them, as I was going to give some away to other people, they were a couple of years old, and I wanted to be sure they were still good.  The results of the germination test were 100% out of 30 seeds or so.  Hard to get much better than that, I thought.

Everyone I sent the seeds to reported poor germination.  I also got poor germination rates in my garden this year.  I thought this was because the seeds I had were old, so I replanted some of the seeds I saved this year.  Guess what?  Poor germination again.  I even dug up some of the seeds to verify they weren’t eaten by a mouse or something, and they all seemed to be in the ground still.

If you are willing to go back and replant some of the seeds that don’t germinate, or sow heavily and thin, it’s still a great bean.  I wonder what it is about being genetically predisposed to poor germination, that doesn’t go away on it’s own as the result of being selectively seed saved.  Maybe it just needs a few more years of selection.  Maybe I need to sprout them in a paper towel before I plant them.

I grew these beans as companion plants in a few places in my garden this year.  This ended up working very well, because this variety is agressive enough to smother most weeds, but not so tall it gets in the way of many other garden plants growing.

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Heirloom Coffee

For many of us, especially since the latest spike in oil prices, the priority is to eat local foods and buy local products.  Many of us too make an effort to buy as directly from farmers or other producers as possible.  Of course there are many important reasons for this, but what about those products that can’t be obtained locally?

For those of us that don’t live in the tropics, coffee is one of these products.  Many of the same reasons we look for local products are relevant to coffee.

We all know there’s a load of certification programs for different kinds of coffee.  Organic, Fair Trade, Birdsong, you name it.  Many of us also realize that most of these labels are just marketing, and there’s not always a lot of added value that goes along with them.

It turns out there are really a lot of important differences in coffee that concern things we care about.  Most coffees are grown on large faceless plantations, often producing a very low quality product.  Farmers can receive very different levels of compensation, mostly far below what most of us would consider a living wage.  There are heirloom and F1 hybrid varieties of coffee.  Coffee can be grown in environmentally friendly and sustainable ways or can be destructive to the environment.

You can make a really huge difference in many ways according to the kind of coffee you buy, both for social reasons as well as quality.  What’s the secret?  The secret first of all is to roast your own coffee, because the market for pre-roasted coffee is tightly controlled and you have access to many more different kinds of beans if you buy them green.

Once roasted, coffee goes stale in about 2 weeks even when vacuum packed.  This means if you roast and grind your own coffee, you get a freshness you may not experience any other way.  I did a post about this a while ago.

Here in the Netherlands, I purchase green coffee beans from ongebrand.nl.

Until now, I haven’t been able to find a good source for socially responsible green coffee beans elsewhere to recommend to anyone else, but recently I came across a blog dedicated to exactly this topic!  This blog does a much better job explaining all the politics and history of coffee production in the world, and is really worth having a look at, especially if you drink coffee.  This blog is mostly focused on the US, so if anyone else knows of other good sources of green coffee beans elsewhere, I hope you will let us know.

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Garlic Planting Stock

As I usually do every year around this time, I have some extra garlic planting stock to offer to people reading this blog.

This year I grew 90+ varieties, and harvested them at the beginning of August before we left on our trip.  With around 1000 bulbs in total, it’s going to take me a while to go through them and figure out exactly what I have.  I probably won’t be sending any to anyone  for at least a month or so.  Planting time is usually November (at least for those of us in the northern hemisphere), so there’s still plenty of time.

I can’t send any garlic to the US!  Sorry.  If you’re interested, I can reccommend some places to buy garlic planting stock.  I also can’t send it anywhere else with import restrictions for this kind of thing.  The European Union is no problem, and many other places are also no problem.

If I have traded seeds or planting material with you before, I will pay part of the postage.  If you have something to trade now, I will pay all the postage.  Otherwise you have to pay postage.  Contact me for details.  I accept cash in most common currencies, certainly US dollars, Euros and UK Pounds.  People in the EU can also pay by bank transfer (payment in this way outside of the EU is also possible, but the bank fees are at your own expense).

If you’re interested, please send me an email (see the contact page) or leave a comment below making sure to fill your email address in the field provided.  I’ll get back to you with more details, including estimated costs and some information on the varieties I have.

For people coming to the Oxford meeting on 20 September, I’ll probably have some garlic planting stock with me then, hopefully enough for everyone who wants some.  You could still send me an email and arrange this in advance if you want to.

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Real Seeds Newsletter

The Real Seeds Catalogue just posted their 2008 newsletter.  It has a lot of insight into what they are working on and what we can look forward to seeing in the future from them.

For those coming to the Oxford get-together in September, you should have a look through it and come prepared with questions!

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Lots of Tomatoes

The tomatoes really started coming as we were going on vacation, and we ended up leaving a lot behind for friends to eat while we were gone. We also managed to get a load into the dehydrator in between our two trips to Germany and Spain.

Diversity in Tomatoes

One of the things I really enjoy about growing heirloom tomatoes is the diversity. It’s not so much which one tastes the best, or worrying about growing one that isn’t as good as the others, it’s just really nice to have a mix of different kinds and tastes. I’m growing about 25 different ones this year, and while a few were a little disappointing, nearly all have something that makes them special.

Some of my favorites so far are Black Sea Man, Matt’s Wild Cherry, Brown Berry, Hillbilly Flame (the large one in the front of the picture), Emerald Evergreen (the green one in the middle), Nebraska Wedding and Taxi.

For those of you attending the Oxford meeting, I’ll probably have some seeds with me then. For anyone else who would like some seeds, send me an email and we’ll try to work something out. I saved some seeds from several of the varieties, although I’m not sure I have enough for everyone who might want some. I can’t send seeds to the US! If you live in the US, I can tell you where to buy seeds if you’re interested.