Bean vines

[Cornbelt]

I planted some beans for dried storage; can't remember whether great northern or limas, but they are going crazy. I'm not about to put up another bean tree, but since they are for dry beans anyhow, could I just leave them go and cut them with a scythe when the plants are dry?  Will they get a fungus getting all tangled up like they are, or should I thin them out before it gets too late?

[RB1235]

If they are on the ground and stay wet you will loose some of them to rot. Don't worry about a fungus though. If they do get spotty you aren't going to eat the hull anyway. Just sythe them like you said and throw the vine and all on a metal roof or hang up to dry under a patio. I have put them in the attic for a few days as well. When you shell them the beans will be clean as long as there was no bug bites in the shell, the rotten ones will be black, no biggy.

[bilmac]

I wouldn't let them get too dry if you are going to cut them with a scythe, they will probably shatter out. Cut them before they are ready to shatter. I read somewhere to put them in a feed sack to thrash them. I'm in the learning process for dry beans too.

[steg]

+1 for bilmac. when the beans split, the pods sort of twirl with a snap, that's their way of spreading the beans to replant themselves, better to err on the early side than the late side, I pick mine early and put the husks in a paper grocery bag, as many as it takes so as not to overcroud them and let them dry with the bags open. The beans make great soups in the winter, on the old wood stove............steg