Beans – An introduction for Seed Savers zoom 2024

Classification

The name ‘bean’ can have many common meanings and can refer to many different plants.

Beans include important human food plants.

But can also commonly refer to plants that just have seeds in pods.

‘Beans’ are primarily a group of plants in the Fabaceae family. (or the older family name Leguminosae). Fabaceae are the third largest plant family and make up around 7% of all plant species.

The name Faba is usually considered of Italian/latin origin to simply mean ‘edible bean’ but is similar to the words Portuguese fava and Spanish haba  ‘broad bean’.

This family includes what we often call legumes, beans, pulses and peas and also many other common food plants.

Legume can mean both the plant and the ‘fruit’ (or pod with seeds) of a faba plant.

The name ‘pulse’ usually refers to seed of legume plants that are used mainly only in dried form.

They can be found in many forms from large trees to small herbs.

Many – but not all – plants in this family have developed symbiotic relationships with bacteria and other organisms to help provide food in their root systems.

Examples of the most commonly grown and eaten types are the species and cultivars of the genus:

• Phaseolus vulgaris – Common bean, Green bean, French bean
• Phaseolus coccineus – Runner bean
• Phaseolus lunatus – Lima bean
• Phaseolus acutifolius – Tepary bean
• Phaseolus dumosus – the year long bean

Dumosus is a species that is a natural cross between vulgaris and coccineus that grows and looks like both those species together.

Varieties

These species are all originally from the Americas and have had a long complicated history with humans and cultivation. Then in the 1500’s they were taken to Europe and further grown and selected and then traded and distributed to other parts of the world. Many were taken back to the Americas colonies and then interbred again with beans already there. They have been selected for all different reasons and distributed and regrown for so long that the varieties have become vast in number. For example the USA Seed Savers Exchange has over 4000 varieties in its collection.

Within all these species there are many variations in:

• Growth form – climber, bush and in between.
• Colour of the beans and pods
• Eating stages – green pod, shelly and dried.
• Taste of the beans and pods
• Texture of the beans and pods

There is also a lot of recent human history involved in beans and selection for mass food production.

For example in the mid 1880’s Calvin Keeney who established a seed company at LeRoy New York USA selected and bred the beginnings of the stringless green beans that became the starting point for all of the stringless beans we grow now. So if you grow and eat a common green bean now that does not have strings its probably one that started from that breeding process. If you find strings in your beans then it’s probably a very old variety.

• Glycine – soy
• Pisum – pea
• Phaseolus – common green bean
• Vicia – broad bean & vetch
• Cicer – chickpea
• Medicago – alfalfa
• Arachis – peanut
• Trigonella – fenugreek
• Ceratonia – carob
• Vigna – black eyed pea

There are many more common food plants in this very large family including acacia and tamarind.

We will be discussing the most common grown and eaten ‘beans’ that are found in the home garden.

Genus

The focus for this session is mainly on the vulgaris group within the genus Phaseolus.

There are many other groups in this genus that are interesting food plants but it’s a huge topic even when limited to these commonly grown plants.

• Phaseolus vulgaris – Common bean, Green bean, French bean
• Phaseolus coccineus – Runner bean
• Phaseolus lunatus – Lima bean
• Phaseolus acutifolius – Tepary bean
• Phaseolus dumosus – the year long bean

Dumosus is a species that is a natural cross between vulgaris and coccineus that grows and looks like both those species together.

Varieties

These species are all originally from the Americas and have had a long complicated history with humans and cultivation. Then in the 1500’s they were taken to Europe and further grown and selected and then traded and distributed to other parts of the world. Many were taken back to the Americas colonies and then interbred again with beans already there. They have been selected for all different reasons and distributed and regrown for so long that the varieties have become vast in number. For example the USA Seed Savers Exchange has over 4000 varieties in its collection.

Within all these species there are many variations in:

• Growth form – climber, bush and in between.
• Colour of the beans and pods
• Eating stages – green pod, shelly and dried.
• Taste of the beans and pods
• Texture of the beans and pods

There is also a lot of recent human history involved in beans and selection for mass food production.

For example in the mid 1880’s Calvin Keeney who established a seed company at LeRoy New York USA selected and bred the beginnings of the stringless green beans that became the starting point for all of the stringless beans we grow now. So if you grow and eat a common green bean now that does not have strings its probably one that started from that breeding process. If you find strings in your beans then it’s probably a very old variety.