4 BULLETIN 119, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE, 
radiatus, from both of which it differs greatly. The adsuki is prob- 
ably native either in Japan or in Chosen, but the plant 1s not defi- 
nitely known in a wild state. 
DESCRIPTION. 
The adsuki bean is a summer annual, requiring essentially the same 
conditions of climate as the common bean. 
The plants are bushy in habit, growing from 1 to 24 feet high, 
according to variety and soil. The earlier varieties are strictly 
bushy in habit and mostly erect, while the later ones are slightly viny 
at the tips of the stems and branches, and some of them are decum- 
bent. As with other annual legumes, the later varieties are larger 
than the early ones. The whole herbage is somewhat hairy, and the 
leaves persist until the pods are fully mature. The flowers are bright 
yellow, 6 to 12 in a cluster. 
The varieties are very numerous, at least 60 distinct sorts having 
been tested at Arlington farm, and among these as strays or, more 
likely, natural hybrids nearly as many others have been detected. 
The varieties are distinguished mainly by the period of maturity 
and the color of the pods and seeds. 
At Arlington farm the earliest varieties are fully mature in three 
months, while the latest require five months. 
The pods are straw colored in most varieties, brown in a few, and 
blackish in a considerable number. In size the pods vary with the 
seeds, the largest pods being 5 inches long, the smallest 2.5 inches. 
Each pod bears normally 8 to 10 seeds. The pods do not shatter 
readily, but as they are thin the beans may germinate in the pods 
in long-continued wet weather. 
The seeds are subcylindric or but slightly compressed, subtruncate 
at the ends, and but slightly longer than broad. The following colors 
occur in the order of their frequency: Maroon, straw to nearly white, 
cray (really black speckled on a greenish yellow ground color), 
maroon and straw, black, brown, blue-black, and straw. 
The embryo in all cases is nearly white and brittle in consistency. 
The adsuki bean is self-fertile, pods setting perfectly where the 
flowers are bagged. I+ forms natural hybrids readily, more so appar- 
ently than any other related species. In a number of cases the seed 
of a single plant grown in a row produced diverse progeny. Thus 80 
plants were grown from the seed of a plant of S. P. I. No. 19988, 
which had blackish pods and brown seeds. Of these 80 plants 16 had 
maroon seeds, 8 with straw-colored and 8 with blackish pods; 53 
had brown seeds, 17 with straw-colored and 36 with blackish pods; 
and 11 had buff seeds, 4 with brown and 7 with blackish pods. Itis 
probably due to this ease of hybridizing that the varieties of adsuki 
beans are so numerous, and where they are grown near together new 
sorts will constantly appear. 
