Have you already sown your first beans? Are you planning to?
Only a few steps to take part in the competition! >> How can I join?
Who wins?
There are 2 categories of winners:
- The fastest beans to reach 1 meter!
- And the highest beans at the end of the contest!
Each winner will get an a extraordinary surprise package…and at our seed-festival next year we will show an exhibition with the 20 highest and fastest bean varieties of this competition. Let us see your champions!
Entries
We will monitor the competition advancement and present the participants on this page and on our Instagram account.
Contestant: #2 – Global Field Berlin
Country: Germany 🇩🇪
Bean: “Spaghettibohne” or Cowpea
The “Spaghettibohne”, or Cowpea is a climbing bean from the Old World, from Southeast Asia (China). We have chosen this one because all other beans have already been sown! It does not grow as high as others, but is sown in late May and early June. On the other hand, garden beans are sown earlier, in early and mid-May. Beans do not like cold weather, so in Germany they are sown after the “Eisheiligen”(Ice Saints): 5 days in May, where each day is dedicated to a Saint. Only this way can the weather stabilize and become warmer., even if this year, it was already particularly warm!
Contestant: #3 – Nicolas Carton
Country: Spain 🇪🇸
Bean: Mongeta de Cornet
Sowing date: 03.05.2022
In Catalonia, climbing beans are usually sown at the end of June, in order to avoid the drought-sensitive stages of flowering, pod set and pod filling to coincide with the warmest and driest summer months. However, in order to participate in the contest at the same time as the other european regions, I found one variety which is usually sown at the end of April: “mongeta de Cornet”. I sowed it in a pot on the 3.05, I’m going to transplant it in the garden soon. It is said to be less sensitive to drought, but it may not climb as high as the other ones, so let’s see how fast it is!
Update June 25th:
“They are about 70 cm! I sowed them in pots and transplanted them in the garden when they had about 4 leaves. They are growing together with maize but I put poles for them to climb, because they are growing faster than maize in the rather dry and poor soil. Now, they are flowering, with the first pods.”
Contestant: #4 – Gabi Horn
Country: Germany 🇩🇪
Bean: Kroatische Stange (“Croatian Pole”
Sowing date: 14.05.2022
This bean can grow up to 4 meters high! I chose the Croatian pole because it has a very nice core, tastes very good, is productive and also grows quite high. Other varieties this year, however, already further.
Update:🎉Hit 1 meter on July 3rd!🎉
It is exciting, I have sown the bean on a tipi with 3 poles:
On 3 July, the bean had already grown to 2 m on the first pole, about 1 m on the second pole and even less on the third pole … I willI will continue to observe it and try to work out when it reached 1 m on the 1st pole!
Contestant: #5 – Susan Young
Country: UK 🇬🇧
Bean: Gigantes Bean from crete
Sowing date: 12.05.2022
“I am starting the bean germination by a paper towel method, for extra speed, and it is currently sitting indoors, in a warm cupboard. The soil is too cold here in England at the moment, to sow directly and even in the greenhouse it is not warm enough for germination. It is a Gigantes bean – from this bag of beans that I purchased just recently in an organic food shop in Chania, Crete. The beans are very big and the plants grow vigorously, so this variety will grow tall very quickly.”
Update:🎉Hit 1 meter on June 8th!🎉
Here is bean 5 – a little over 1 metre on June 8th, sown May 12th.
A gigantes bean which is a vigorous variety – started off indoors in warmth, then grown in a large pot in the greenhouse. We have had some cold weather here in the UK, so it would not have been happy outdoors yet.
Contestant: #6 – Daniela Dotzler
Country: Germany, Berlin🇩🇪
Beans: Scarlet Runner Bean, Purple Prince (on the picture)
Sowing date: 28.04.2022
Update:🎉The Purple Prince(left) bean hit 1 meter on June 11th! The Scarlet Runner bean (right)hit 2.5 meters on June 17th!🎉
Contestant: #7 – Andréia Belchior
Country: Northern Portugal 🇵🇹
Beans: Red, white beans, buuter Bean, patolas Bean (white or purple Bean), black Bean, black-eyed Bean (feijão fradinho), broad bean (on the picture), peas, chickpeas…
Sowing date: 18.05.2022 End of May
“My mom plants several types of beans. She has a small cottage in the North of Portugal where everybody practices subsistence farming. The products are very tasty and fresh! We eat beans dry of fresh ( when they are collected before they mature)- We use it for salad, soup, rice or pasta, to do a typical feijoada portuguesa ( I do the vegan versión. The traditional takes meat), also in puree. Beans have multiple options and they are very tasty!!”
Contestant: #8 – Virginia
Country: Germany 🇩🇪
Beans: Grah Cepek from Albania, White Cowpea
Sowing date: 25.05.2022, and 20.05.2022
“I have sown two varieties. Candidate for the fastest bean is a white cowpea, which I grow together with 20 other varieties in a greenhouse in Neukölln for seed preservation. As for the longest bean, I will try a bean from the seed packet, which I got from Albania via Global Bean Seed Exchange. Hopefully they will grow over the whole house ;).”
Contestant: #10 – Mara Welton
Country: USA 🇺🇸
Beans: Cherokee trail of tears bean
Sowing date: 16.05.2022
“In the US, beans are generally sown when the threat of frost has passed. Here in Vermont, on the Northeastern side of the US, that time begins in mid-May.”
The Cherokee Trail of Tears bean memorializes the forced relocation of the Cherokee Indians in the mid-nineteenth century. They carried this bean throughout this infamous walk, which became the death march for thousands of Cherokees; hence the ‘Trail of Tears.’ In the face of its poignantly dismal history, the shiny, jet-black seeds are used with pride in many traditional American Indian dishes. The seeds are encased in six-inch, greenish-purple pods. These small attractive beans are dried before consumed, and have a delicious rich flavor. Source: www.fondazioneslowfood.com
Update June 16th:
The bean is growing wonderfully, but maybe not as fast as I thought it would be! Beans emerged May 24, and I took this latest measurement yesterday, June 15.
Update: 🎉reached 1 meter on June 30th!🎉
Milestones for my beans:
- Sown on May 16th.
- Emerged on May 24th
- Were 23 cm on June 15th
- Were 100 cm on June 30th
- Reached 2m just today, July 5th!
This is the point when these beans really start to take off, in my experience, is when they reach 2m. That’s when they get extremely vigorous and start to flower and push out their beautiful pods and continue to vine upwards and leaf out.
Contestant: #11 – Annigje Jacobs
Country: Burgundy, France 🇫🇷
Beans: “Chair de Chéu”
Sowing date: 19.05.2022
The “Chair” in the bean’s name means “flesh”, as when dried, it takes on the color of human skin. It has been cultivated for centuries in Chéu, a small village in the north-eastern part of France. The most suitable area for this bean to grow is an area with sandy soil. However too much humidity is bad for this bean, as insects destroy the seeds! It is very savory and soft, and many traditional recipes use this bean: fricassée, spiced beef stew… Source: fondazioneslowfood
I’ve also added a photo of the seeds (it says Normandy on it, but that’s the place where the beans were harvested, not the name of the bean…). May is a good time to sow in the ground where I live.
Update:
This photo was taken on the 11th of june, one ‘pocket’ of beans grew quicker than the other.
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How to participate?
STEP 0. Become a contestant! Sow your favourite bean variety, save the sowing date and send us an email at . That’s all we need! If you have already sown it, don’t worry. You can still take part in the competition, as long as you have the sowing date!
NEXT STEPS
- We will give you a participant number! Take a first picture with your seed or young plant, your participant number (and yourself, if you like!) and send it to or tag the.global.bean on Instagram. Mention your own name, your location, the name of the bean, and why you like and chose it, and why you have sown it at this time (tell us more about the climatic conditions of your regions! Perhaps you want to share with us at what time you expect to harvest) You are welcome to send us further pictures, including of your plot!
- As soon as it reaches 1 meter, take a photo with a benchmark and save the date. Send your second photo to and/or post it and tag the.global.bean on Instagram.
- As soon as the plant has reached its final height, take a photo with a benchmark to show how high it grew and send your photo to and/or post it and tag the.global.bean on Instagram
- For any questions please contact Lisa Hoffmann via
- Find out more about the Global Bean project and its 40 partners from 15 countries
- Register for the global bean project’s monthly newsletter
