Ploughing down Winter beans

16 October 1998

Ploughing down Winter beans

Question

COULD you advise on the latest safe timing for ploughing down winter
beans (variety Target)?

Stephen Johnson, Johnson Farms

Response

Mike Bearman, PBI Cambridge

In normal circumstances ploughing target winter beans in up until
Christmas would be fine. You can get away with doing it in January but
once you go beyond Christmas you do run risks of whether you get
sufficient cold to vernalise them.

What most people do when drilling beans after potatoes or sugar beet
is judge by whether they can get on the land to plough. If it is very
wet there is a risk the beans could go mouldy before they germinate
but only if it is extremely wet and waterlogged.

Sowing rate is around 25-27 seeds/sq m to give 18 plants/sq m coming
out of the winter. That might be increased to 30 seeds/sq m if
conditions suggested seed losses could be high.