Early Sunday morning, between bouts of rain, when I went to the tomato patch with a cup of coffee to stroll the perimeter, I spied the yard-long beans at the far edge of the plot. While devising my tepee system for the other garden plot, I'd completely forgotten about these beans. I had planted only one pack of seeds, enough for one short row. They were old seeds, and I had expected that they would not even sprout, but, behold, every seed had come up. Presumably, they'll need staking, too. But, since there's just one row, the two-row system I'd made for the other beans would be overkill here. I'd have to come up with another plan.
After making my loop around the tomato patch, I headed back to the house. On the way, I stopped to get something from my Jeep, and ended up cleaning out all the books, cups, and receipts from the passenger seat. Beneath all the clutter, I found a pack of giant sunflower seeds I'd bought earlier in the week. Cool! Into the garden they'll go, as soon as the ground dries a little! I brought them inside and stuck them in the pocket of my gardening apron.
The next day, while I was driving and pondering how I was going to support the yard-long beans, I remembered a conversation I'd had with another gardener last year. He plants his running beans in the corn row, and simply lets the beans run up the corn.
The one time I tried growing corn, raccoons got every single ear. I have no intention of planting corn, ever again.
Then, I remembered the giant sunflower seeds.
They'll have stalks as big as my wrist.
I hurried home and, braving the mud, stuffed a sunflower seed into the ground between each bean plant.
I probably should have planted the sunflowers first, to give them a head start, but this may still work, if those sunflower seeds sprout and get busy growing right away.
And won't they look cute?
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