the little wild kingdom

[flowerbug]

made some good progress on bean shelling yesterday and this morning.

the part bag (about 1/4 full) i shelled out yesterday was from a poorer soil garden and there were not very many decent quality beans in there (perhaps a half cup). there were a mix of varieties.

today's shelling i did a box full (which is about 1/4 of a bag) and it was Purple Dove beans picked from the very last garden i planted. almost every pod was full of nicely shaped beans. only a few were wrinkled or not edible. even the wrinkled ones will be edible but i'll put them in a different container from the rest. the wrinkles came from them being finished off by the frosts and not quite done. i've rarely had so many bean pods look nearly perfect without mold spots or damage from bugs or critters. i had about 2 cups worth which is a lot of beans from this variety and a lot of the pods had already shattered so those beans are still on the bottom of the bag. i'm hoping about 6lbs from this bag total but won't be able to measure that until i'm done (and likely i'll forget to do it by then ). have another bag just like it...

 

[flowerbug]

finished shelling another bag of beans... 3lbs of dry beans. not as many as i thought but still a welcome bonus as it came from a garden outside the fence. only ten more to go, but before i can get back to them i really need to get the garlic bulbs taken apart and some cloves set aside for planting so they can get put in a garden. i know where i want to put them and the space is even ready for them for a change.