Project long green beans

I enjoy eating long green beans, whether raw or cooked.  I prefer them when they are mature and green, still crispy.  Previously, I had done smaller experiments in planting them, looking at soil content, support structure and water quantity as well as sunlight.  This time around, we decided to plant a lot more than previously, about 100 plants.
I started with seeding them in small polybags and once they were about 10cm with several leaves, they were transplanted.  The planting beds were also prepare carefully, removing the weeds and then mixing the soil with "seasoned" pure goat manure and then covered with black plastic.  The beds was covered to serve two main purposes: to reduce the weed and grass growth as well as to help retain moisture in the soil.
Since we do not use any chemical herbicides, it was essential to remove the weeds and grass prior to planting and to control any new growth.  It would be a waste for all the nutrients from the goat manure to be used by grass and weeds.  Covering the beds also meant that we would reduce the time taken to maintain the beds - a big savings in time as we would have to manually remove the weeds and grass.  I was hoping that it would also mean that we would not have to water them but rely on the rain to supply the necessary water to the plants and that has come to fruition.

Five weeks after transplanting, it began flowering  and about at six weeks, the first beans began to appear.  The intial harvest was around 6kg and now it is producing about 15 kg per week.  I am happy with the results in terms of the yield but I learnt that we need to improve how we support the plants.  On a weekly basis, I remove the mature leaves and try not to let any dry out on the plant.  By removing the old leaves, it encourages the plant to produce new shoots and more flowers.  Without old leaves drying out on the plant which turns mushy when it rains, it helps prevent mold from forming on the plant which can kill the plant.  As the leaves are maintained, I also manually remove the black aphids which literally suck the life out of the plant.  All the time and effort is worth it when I see the quality of green beans that we produce.  SubhanAllah.