I dont sée thèm. Looked a bit with ecosia. There’s coco blanc, which means white. But no coco bleu. Why you want European ones if i may ask?
try “haricots blue lake” . I remember having cultivated them a few years back. They are white.
Blue Coco are reasonably available in the US (at least 3 small to mid-size seed houses stock them), and I tried some 5 or so years ago. They turned out to have such good flavor that we plant about half of our bean row with them every year. They are also very popular in our university campus garden.
Since then, I’ve found two other beans attributed to the same French colonials. Black coco are a bush type with US availability and are a top-notch dry bean for eating (the story is they are so good that the French are willing to tolerate the dark bean broth). If I had more space to grow dry beans, I would grow them every year. White coco or Coco de Paimpol are also a bush type and are traditionally eaten as a shelly (semi-mature) bean. I got a pound of dry ones from a specialty dry bean house this year for eating and saved 20 seeds to plant so I can experience them fresh.
Thank you for the tip, Beth. A casual internet search didn’t show me a source in Europe, but it is great to have all these (international) bean varieties in the back of my mind and know what people think about them. I guess I am a little hesitant about a bean that was developed in such a different climate…You say that it has superior taste, how about vigor and health?
And thanks @isabelle for the tip with the blue lake. What did you like about them?
I believe I will not sow beans again this year (unless the first batch fails) but I definitely will keep your suggestions in mind!
Ah! I misunderstood completely. I thought you wanted us to send them to you! But it’s a tip.
Well i think the French have not saved one of those seeds, , they thought to ask the neighbors in spring, but the neighbors thought similar! Gone, just like that.
They have been quite vigorous and productive for me inland from Los Angeles. Ideally, they would have a 3 meter tall trellis. I make do with 6 and 8 foot trellises. In the early summer (planted in March), we’ll have 6-8 weeks of picking 4-8 liters of beans every other day from 2 1/2 meters of row. The fall crop doesn’t run quite as long, as they have trouble getting started when it’s over 40C.
For my mom in the middle of the country, they’re a good fall crop but not such a good spring crop (she only has 6-8 weeks from last frost to first 38C afternoon, so bush beans work better).
And, my in-laws in the Rocky Mountain foothills almost to the Canadian border tried them last year and liked them well enough to plant them again this year.
They are a bit more resistant to powdery mildew than average beans and plants I’ve left all winter produce a few beans all the way through the short days (but I get more volume from snap and shelling peas). They are about average for heat tolerance for beans. Rattlesnake beans hold on about two weeks longer into August before stopping production. I’ve never been in a very humid climate with the disease pressures that come in that package.
Well it was just a packet I was given by friends. I didn’t notice a significant vigour but the community liked them as greens. I surely have some of them in my grex, but I no longer track individual varieties. and I cultivate beans primarily for the protein, so I harvest them dry, not green.
Well, @APUCommunityGarden, they sound great for you. My greatest challenge is propably not heat, 30 °C is about our maximum here (not that there aren’t exceptions) but that our springs are really totally unpredictable. For example, sinced I sowed 8 days ago, it has rained every day and was quite cold. According to the forcecast it will continue to rain the whole week. I need beans that can endure these conditions…Additionally, the days get markedly shorter and cooler in the end of August, so I like beans that start fast so I get a good harvest until then. My Dasinger keep blooming and producing until the first frost, which I like very much. i still don’t know enough about diseases in my beans to say something about that. But your Blue coco definitely sounds great, espescially, that it seems to be adapted to a broad spectrum of climates. So if it ever is available in Europe, I know what to get!
@isabelle, thanks for your assessment of the blue lake. It sounds like it is not quite the material I`m looking for, but thank you nonetheless!