Why Beans Have Strings
The often ignored flowers of the common garden bean are a sight to behold!
Nature is so extraordinary in its daily miracles it makes the gardener humble and enchants him at the same time.
My grandfather used to make up stories about the garden. He was a wonderful storyteller with a vivid imagination, and made up stories on the spot to persuade me to eat my veggies.
There is a whole series featuring cauliflower, cabbage, corn, you get the idea.
I am going to share one of his stories with you; it is of course about beans.
One day a little bean pod decided to venture all the way down the vine from the sunny spot at the top of the trellis where it was born.
The growing bean had been watching all the wonderful plants in the vegetable garden from its location and wanted to visit them and exchange stories about their growth habits and surroundings.
It wandered around for a while, admiring the broad leaves of the purple cabbage and the large seed heads of the dill plants and just when it figured it should head back home so its mother didn’t worry, the pod snapped open and one of the beans fell out.
The little green bean was so distraught it cried all the way home. It clambered the vine, sobbing its pods off, and reached its little spot at the top of the trellis. The concerned mother bean asked what was wrong and little bean showed her the open pod with another bean just about to fall out.
Momma bean laughed kindheartedly and told the little one not to worry about the fallen beans, they were going to become large and healthy plants, just like the one they called home, but in order to keep the shell from popping open too soon on future travels she got a needle and some thread and sew the pods closed.
In case anybody was wondering why string beans have strings, now you know.
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