Common bean crosses (dry beans)

I'm just curious to know what crosses of common beans look like?  Does anyone have pictures to share?  

I bought the bag of 15 bean soup mix, and went through the entire bag to separate the beans from the split peas & broken beans.  Then, by variety where I could, and by type/color/shape where suitable after that (lots of white bean varieties of all different sizes).  Out of the entire bag, I ended up with two beans that were clear crosses, so I of course separated them to grow out later.

The majority of the lentils, garbanzo beans, etc. will simply be planted for nitrogen fixation in my corn plot, and be left through winter with no harvest planned.  There are some however, that I am curious about trying to cross next year if nature helps out.

I found a few white kidney beans (cannellini?) that I will interplant with some dark red kidney beans to see what happens.

Has anyone had crosses of cranberry beans, red beans, brown beans, black turtle beans, pinto beans, white lima beans, navy beans, great northern beans, or kidney beans?

I haven't tried hand pollinating dry beans yet, but have grown navy beans, red beans, and dragon's tongue beans in the past with no crossing of the harvested dry beans.  Does it show up in the 2nd generation beans?

In beans, a cross only shows up in the next generation. You can't tell by looking at a seed whether the embryo contains a cross or not.

The cross pollination rate of common beans averages about 5% across gardens and ecosystems, but people don't notice because if a highly inbred variety crosses with itself, it hasn't really crossed. I plant many different varieties of beans, all jumbled together, to encourage cross pollination.

Here's an example. What the mother looked like.  



Here's what the second generation looked like:



Here's what the next generation looked like:



And the population a year later:


You can't tell, by sorting random beans from a factory, that a bean is crossed. It might just be mixed up. Plenty of seed gets hung up in combines, trucks, and factories. It's good training to pay attention to shape, size, glossiness, color, patterning, etc.

Thank you for the info!  I will have to grow out the second generation seed for sure to see what might've outcrossed.

Thank you for the generational photos as well,  it's always interesting to me how you can get a "throwback" from past generations just show up.

The two beans that I thought were crossed were different in color than anything I'd seen before, which is why I thought they were crosses. I could be wrong,  but I'll grow them out to see just in case. I agree that it would be rare since each bean variety is grown commercially & harvested separately.

Do you find that in your bean landrace you still get around 5% crossing, or is too hard to tell once the colors & shapes have changed from the parents?  

Does selecting for open pollination by saving natural crosses help "fix" that trait over time, or do they always produce the self pollinating flowers?

I gave up trying to keep track of crossed beans. Like Joseph said you can't tell the first year and unless you pay very close attention and keep good records you also can't know if they were already crossed when you got them. And then, after that first year they segregate into a bunch of new variations. When they start doing that, how do you know if it is a new cross or a segregation of an old one? Again, you have to pay very close attention, plant at least semi-isolated and keep very good records.  

Also, I'm pretty sure that the color of the seed coat isn't the only thing that is different in a cross. I have at least five different kinds of Pinto beans where the color and pattern of the seed coat is the same but the size and shape of the bean and the pods, as well as the growth habit of the plants is different.

And I think that some varieties of beans, for example an old one called Refugee, some black ones like Cherokee Trail of Tears and Ideal Market are more prone to crossing. Once a promiscuous variety and its descendants are loosed in your patch, and especially if you have a lot of bumblebees, all bets are off.

Pictures below are of some from a few years ago, before I gave up on keeping track.

Thanks for the photos.  It's surprising how much variation you can get over the generations.

I went to another store that just happened to sell cranberry beans by the bag, and the two beans that I thought were crosses, were in fact cranberry beans (there were a few in the bags that were identical).  They just had the red with tan spots instead of tan with red spots.  I've not used cranberry beans before, but for some reason they seem like a good solid bean to me.  They are slightly larger than pinto & more plump thickness-wise too.  I'll have to look up recipes for my newfound bean experiment.

I would imagine all the beans in the 15 bean soup mix are bush types rather than vining since I'm sure they are harvested by combine, but I'm already excited to see what next year brings.

I really need to get to work on finding some more gardening space to borrow.  It seems like I just want to grow on a much larger scale than I can right now.  I have sweet corn, watermelon, and now dry bean projects "in the works", with more seed waiting on me to have the space to grow it out...but I'll save that for a new thread.

Due to living in a high-altitude desert, the cross pollination rate on my beans is closer to 2%.

The industrialized seed industry, and heirloom preservationists have put tremendous effort (perhaps inadvertently) into selecting for a low cross pollination rate in common beans. That has lead to rampant inbreeding depression and low yields.

By replanting seeds from naturally occurring hybrids, I am selecting for beans that cross pollinate more readily. I am also selecting for insect populations that are more interested in bean flowers.

The simple habit of growing mixed populations of beans increases the natural cross-pollination rate, and yield, even without specifically identifying hybrids. That happens because the naturally occurring hybrids (between distinct types of beans) are more productive. The whole population shifts towards being more promiscuous.

My favorite type of bean are what I call semi-runners. Their growth habit is mid-way between pole beans and bush beans. The vines tend to just lay on stuff rather than twirling around things. They are very productive. I grow them sprawling over the weeds that grow with them. I harvest by throwing entire plants onto a canvas, and then jumping on them, or beating them with a stick.

Good info, thank you!  

I'm sure most people wouldn't look this close, but has anyone noticed in their crossed populations, a change in the flower shapes to allow access for pollinating insects?  My understanding is, most beans are already self-pollinated by the time the flower opens up enough for insects to access, which is probably why the crossing rate is so low.  

I can see how even adding some crosses to a population of self-pollinators might produce a "hybrid-vigor" effect & increase yield.

I'm quickly converting to the "Landrace Everything" outlook when it comes to my personal growing.  I've come to value beneficial traits & good results more than purity.  Though with some things, it's nice to have a complete harvest at one time, rather than over a period of time.  On others, a prolonged harvest is better.  

I do struggle at times with which concept I'm working toward:  Organized chaos with no end or end-goal trajectory resulting in a semi-stabilized locally adapted variety.  Honestly, I think a bit of both are true for my situation since even when starting with many varieties, my environment & personal preferences will influence & refine the direction my mixtures will go.  The tricky part now is, planning my 2023 garden to accommodate all that I want it to.

Cy Cobb wrote:I'm sure most people wouldn't look this close, but has anyone noticed in their crossed populations, a change in the flower shapes to allow access for pollinating insects?  

On beans, I noticed changes in flower color, which makes them more attractive to hummingbirds.

On peas, I noticed that the population shifted to larger, more colorful flowers, which are more attractive to pea-weevils that burrow into the flower.