106 



VEGETABLE GARDENING. 



a green state, such as string or snap beans, may be sown any 

 time from the middle of May to the first of August, and with 

 good prospects of a good crop of green pods. Some kinds 

 have edible pods in less than six weeks from the time the seed 

 is sown. 



Harvesting Beans. — For use in a green state, the pods of 

 some kinds are picked as soon as large enough to use and 

 when they are tender and fresh: in other cases, the beans are 

 used when still fresh and as soon as they are large enough to 

 shell from the pods. Field beans are harvested by being 

 pulled by hand or gathered with a bean gatherer when they 

 are ripe, laid in rows until dry enough for threshing, then 

 threshed at once or stored for threshing later on. Great care 

 should be taken in storing the pods to prevent molding of the 

 beans, and in threshing not to break the beans. In a small 

 way, beans may be threshed out by hand, but on a large scale 

 any common threshing machine may be used, providing suit- 

 able changes are made in it so it will not break the beans. 



Varieties of Bush Beans. — There are many varieties of bush 

 beans having desirable qualities, but only a few of the most 



valuable are mentioned here: 



Field Beans.— White Mar- 

 row, Burlingame Medium, Navy, 

 and Snowflake. 



Waxen Podded Beans. — 

 Dwarf Golden Wax and Dwarf 

 Black Wax. 



Shell and String Beans. 

 — Yellow Six Weeks, Early Mo- 

 hawk, Cranberry and Dwarf 

 Horticultural. 



Japanese, Soy or Soja 

 Beans. — These are easily grown, 

 but on account of their inferior 

 quality are not much used here. 

 Dwarf Lima Beans.— These are highly esteemed by 

 those who know them, and, although smaller in size than the 

 pole Limas, are supplanting them in this section and com- 

 ing into general use, on account of their being more cer- 



Fig, 47.— Dwarf Lima bean. 



