Kitchen Garden Forum

I have a packet of Cherokee Trail of Tears which look like



I have also been sent some saved seeds, which I am told are Cherokee Trail of Tears and look like this



Assuming that the black beans are the real ones, what on earth are the others. Does anyone know?

Sorry about the photos being fuzzy

Hi Chantal,

I belive that the black seed are Cherokee Trail of Tears and I think the brown seed are runner bean.

Regards


Kevin

The brown ones certainly look like Runner Beans to me. I've got a half used packet of Scarlet Emperor which I seem to remember are that colour. French climbing beans ("Blauhilde") Purple Podded variety are brown, but quite small and don't have any black flecks on them.

Dear Chantal, you will have to grow them now to see what you get.
I must admit the beans in the second photo do look larger than the first photo, but i know size doesn't matter.

Maybe this will help to give a sense of proportion

Top: Runner beans
Middle: Unknown
Bottom: Cherokee Trail of Tears



They're much smaller than normal runners, although the shape is more runner than French bean.

I will plant and report back.

I'm tempted to amend my diagnosis. Maybe a runner bean got into bed with a French climbing bean one night and this is the outcome. Perhaps you have ambi-sextrous bees in your neck of the woods? Will be interested to learn what they turn out to be after you've planted them.

Could they be a Borlotto?

That's an idea Geoff, I've checked my borlotti beans and they're not dissimilar. I'm going to plant them well away from anything else and see what happens. Perhaps we ought to run a sweep

I have some seeds from an 'old variety' of french purple flowering climbing beans that are small and black simlar to the ones in the first photograph

I have some old variety Blue Lake French Bean and they too are black and have purple flowers, but the black one's in the photo are from the Real Seed Catalogue so should be genuine Trail of Tears.

The mystery deepens.

The mystery is even deeper now

The unknown beans were planted away from the others so I'd not get confused. They grew as a sort of flat French bean, but the pods are the size of runners. The pods were red streaked and rather stringy.

However, having picked some dried pods, they contained black and white beans unlike the ones that were sown which were brown and black (see photo above). Seedling will bear me out here, she was there and is as confused as me.

What the hell is going on here?

I'll take some photos and post them when I get a moment.