Many of you are aware that I love to grow pole beans. They are so incredibly productive and easier to grow than you might think. And since I haven’t done a video on this topic for a while, I felt it was time for a new one!
As I explain in the video, I also enjoy growing bush beans but pole beans give us huge harvests. We use them in soups and stews, casseroles, as side dishes, and also in bean salads. And I freeze a lot of them! So I couldn’t image growing a garden without this amazing crop.
Last year, I grew bush beans in a couple of our raised beds. My plan was to donate all of those to our local food bank. While it was a reasonable amount of of beans, I kept adding in lots of pole beans, too.
If you’ve been following me for a while, you know that we grow pole beans on an arbor. We’ve been doing that since 2008. It looks really cool but also provides the bean vines with plenty of vertical space to grow. Plant supports should be at least 6′ tall in order for the vines to do their best.
I get a LOT of questions about where I bought the 4 trellises that make up our bean arbor. I answer that in my video, but wanted to do it here, too. We bought them at a Kroger’s garden center in 2008. They had put all of their trellises 50% off, right at the beginning of the garden season! Talk about good luck. It’s worth checking there as well as at garden centers, home centers, and even online resources. I hope you have good luck finding something that will work great you!
Before we get to the video, I wanted to clarify that this is part one of two parts. Why? Well, I wanted to take you through the steps of starting beans from seed and I’ll need to harden them off before I can plant them. Hardening-off refers to gradually introducing indoor-started seedlings to the intensity of the sun. And when I say “gradually,” I really mean it! I’ll walk you through the process in part two. But I do have a video about hardening off, which you can watch on my YouTube channel.
Speaking of part two, my plan is to show you how the seedlings germinated and talk about the hardening-off process. Then I’ll show you how to plant the seedlings, cover plant care, and what to do with your bean harvests.
OK, here’s part one of my video on How to Grow Pole Beans & Bush Beans:
Did you enjoy part one on this topic? Are you going to grow your own beans as a result? I hope so! Stay tuned for part two (in 2 weeks) and please make yourself at home on my YouTube channel. I have over 660 videos on all sorts of gardening topics. And remember that I have a playlist of my vegetable-themed videos as well: Vegetables playlist. Then you can pick and choose what you’d like to watch. My videos come out every Thursday.