North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["Kieran &/or Donna" <holycow@frontiernet.net>]

Jerry, 

    This was standard practice here in Tennessee, using beans passed on from the natives.  It requires 2 things, a good stout field corn that won't fall over easily, and a type of bean that is shade tolerant.  The "cornfield beans" and cutshort or shortcut beans are the kind you want.  I used to have so many kinds of beans, and am down to only a few, but I have what you want.  My "Patarge Head" ("Partridge Head", there's no accounting for spelling or pronounciation in the south) I originally picked from plants growing on corn. 

    I think the limiting factor on this kind of thing is that as you go west, it may get too dry, and esp when you get into windy prairie areas the corns tend to be shorter and the whole mess would blow over easier.  Seed Savers Exchange did an article years ago where some people tried this in Minnesota, using native corns that looked like yucca plants and native beans that were really just like half runner types, bush beans that developed some runners later on.  They were just absolutely baffled by the beans reaching over to the corn (they'd planted rows 42" apart, like any ordinary garden) and getting all tangled up with the corn.  They tried to untangle the bean plants from the corn so they could hang the beans up to dry and then threshed them.  We expect the beans to grow on the corn, would plant bean seeds just a few inches to a foot away from the corn, and then we'd pick the individual pods.  It's really too wet in Tennessee to grow dryshell beans, they will sprout in the pods and ruin.  So people grew cutshorts which make fat seeds in thin tender pods, you string and break them like you were gonna cook them, then spread them out to dry that way.  The pods shrink wrap around the seeds and are called "Leather Britches".  To cook, you soak them overnight and cook like dry beans.  I hate canned green beans and frozen green beans, I only like green beans fresh and as Leather Britches.  The people with the Patarge Head were the same way, they use a food dryer to make their leather britches.  They would also do water bath beans once a year, a canner full of jars boiled for 8 hours.  They said they don't have that bad taste that you get with pressure canned green beans.     Donna