HOW TO GROW GREEN BEANS IN A CONTAINER

Green Beans

You can grow green beans in a container just at the corner of your house or your garden but you may want to ask if growing green beans in a container are worth it? Or is it not safer to grow it in the fields where you can really get the kind of yields we need to be able to live sustainably? But you will be surprised what the amount of production you can get from growing green beans in a container.

To get started, you have to decide on the type of green beans you want to grow – a bush type beans or a pole type beans. For containers, a bush type beans are heavily recommended because it tends to grow rapidly; you will get high production indeed. Although you may not get beans throughout the entire summer from a given plant, one of the things you can do is to plant at 3 weeks interval and that way you can have a steady stream of beans throughout the summer months.

HOW TO GROW GREEN BEANS IN A CONTAINER 

Get a Decent Container 

To get started, what you need to do is to first select your green beans and a pretty decent container. Beans are not particularly picky or fussy, so you can use just about any type of container. You can use a rubber-made container or you can use a recycling bin; the bottom line is that any of these would work wonderfully for the beans. However, your choice of size of a container will determine the number of seeds you can plant in each.

Growing beans in an indoor glass jar

Choose Your Soil Mix

What is probably most important is the type of growing medium you use. It is recommended to use a mix of compost, peat moss and vermiculite to accelerate growth and promote a stronghold for tender young roots. This combination is called Mel’s Mix and it is one of the best mixtures you can make use of in a container garden.

Another soil mix to consider is a mix of compost, triple 13, bone meal, green sand, and azomite. Tripple 13 is a balanced fertilizer in nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium. This fertilizer will continue to feed the plants for about 3 months as the plants take feeds too from the compost. Bone meal and green sand are also long-lasting fertilizers, but the latter further puts potassium to the soil. Azomite, also known as rock powder, is necessary because of the minerals in it.

Potting soil is another option. Although it seems like a safe product, it may be difficult in choosing potting soil. Potting soil can get compacted and sometimes you can get a little bit of nodule on the roots which will hinder the growth of the plants. While with Mel’s Mix, you are going to have a much greater production because the roots will grow rapidly and you are going to have much success that way.

Planting

In growing green beans in a container, be sure the soil is richly moist. Do not put too many seeds in a container. Once you put your beans in the soil, you may want to plant them like three to six inches apart and about two inches away from the edge of the container. The size of a container should determine the number of seeds to be planted in it. If your container is about the width size of 30 centimeters, ensure the soil in it does not take more than 6 seed plants. This is very important to be able to get substantial growth out of them and the concentration of nutritional value.

But you may grow pole beans in a container using a 2-foot by 2-foot space and after germination, distanced to about 6 to 10 inches apart. Another thing to consider in planting pole beans is that you will need to add some tall wooden sticks. This is because this type of green beans stretch tall as they grow and need a pole (hence its name) to wrap around. You can use about 8-foot tall sticks for this process. For a sizeable container, you can poke three 8-feet long wooden sticks into the soil. Plant three-pole beans seeds per pole and you will see them grow, snaking round the sticks to the very top.

Growing and Harvest

What you need to do is that once it starts to grow, you will want to pick it through regularly, but you will start seeing flowers again immediately after you picked them. You will probably go through a couple of these cycles but it will stop during summer. So it would be nice to plant every three weeks. Between these periods, as one grows, start another row behind it and when the first finally grows, close it out and move those up forward and let those grow to cascade over the side as well. That way, you can have a regular supply of beans throughout the summer.

When maturely grown, these plants come out as lush green. A few plants can truly give you a remarkable amount of production. So it does not actually take a lot of seeds to produce a lot of beans for your family. But have it at the back of your mind that each type of seed is different depending on how long it takes to sprout. Using the bush type beans, in particular, will give you more amount of production. It takes about 2 weeks or so (about 50 days after planting depending on the variety of seeds used) to produce its first set of crops. For the pole type beans, it takes about 60 days after planting depending on the variety of seeds used. But it is more likely to produce continuously until the first wind of frost. So, pole beans tend to amass much more harvest than bush beans in the long run.

Another edge the pole beans have over the bush beans is that you don’t need as many plants as the bush beans. The pole beans also tend to do better against pests and diseases, probably because they grow tall.

Container-grown Green Beans is Sustainable

Green beans are some of the best plants to grow in your container garden and they can be delicious. Not only will container-grown green beans give you that fresh taste and crisp crunch, but it will also save you a lot of money you would normally have to spend intermittently at stores. More so, you can make some cool cash from it if you decided to be more productive about it. Besides all of these, it creates a natural green atmosphere for your environment and your family.

HOW TO CARE FOR GREEN BEANS

Here are tips to care for your green beans grown in a container or the garden. Your care process begins with your seed selection. Find that green beans that are easy to grow and have high yields and germinates well in cool temperature.

Determine your last frost date in the spring and count backward 30 days to plant your green bean seeds in your container or garden. You can plant the seed as soon as the soil temperature is over 60^oF. Also, make sure your PH is about 6.0 and your site location gets about 4 – 6 hours sunlight a day. 

A soil thermometer will be readily handy in this sense.

In preparing the planting site, make sure to add fresh compost to the top layer of the soil. For planting proper, use a square foot space guiding, be it in a container or within the garden. Using the square foot space guide, plant 9 beans seed per square foot.

Beans are part of the legume family and legumes can synthesize with bacteria in the soil. Once the plant roots synthesize with the bacteria in the soil, the plant can pull up nitrogen from the air and convert it into what is called nitrogen fixation. The roots will then develop the needed nutritional component that will feed the beans plants and can as well feed neighboring plants if planted in a bed.

To ensure you have bacteria in your soil, it is recommended you get inoculants from your seed supplier company. It is inexpensive but one thing to consider is that some are blended for different types of crops. Using inoculants is pretty straight forward. Put your seeds into a jar and pour some inoculant in it, then add a little water and shake the jar. Now you are ready for planting.

Place the seeds in one-inch holes you have created and gently cover them with the soil. For the next 5 to 7 days until they germinate, keep them moist with an overhead shower and when they germinate, move it to dripper irrigation. If you can’t use dripper irrigation as a result of container planting, try to water the soil without getting it fully soaked. This will help prevent disease. At this time, also apply organic mulch such as grass clippings or dead leaves. This will allow the soil to stay moist and it will also give the earthworms food. The earthworms will eat the mulch and then convert into worm casings which are natural fertilizers. You can do this on all your vegetables as well.

It would be nice to also create a light fence around your container or planting beds to prevent the growing plants from falling over. A small light fence can help support them on each other and prevent cracking.

Green beans are ready to harvest when they reach about 4 to 7 inches long. Frequent harvesting will ensure that the plant keeps producing. At the end of the season, cut the plant off at the base and leave the nitrogen fixed roots into the soil.