How to Grow Beans

Planting Beans

Grow beans by starting seeds indoors, or direct sow outdoors any time after the last spring frost date. Plant in a medium to large pot, leaving 5-8 cm (2″-3″) between each seed. Cover with 1″ of soil. Make sure the soil is warm. If it is too cold and damp, the seeds are prone to rotting.

To eliminate the guesswork in selecting the right size containers for your plants, we’ve put together a list of commonly grown herbs, veggies, fruit and flowers along with the minimum pot sizes required by each.

Starting a container garden? Grab my free guide on choosing the best sized pots for each veggie, fruit, and herb in your container garden – Veggie Garden Potting Guide

Beans come in two varieties: bush and pole. Bush bean plants are great for container gardens, as the compact plants only grow to about 2 feet high. Pole beans can also be grown in containers, but you will need to supply some sort of support, such as a trellis, for them to climb.

 

Watering Beans

Keep well watered, watering at the base of the plant if possible. Wet leaves can lead to disease in bean plants. Do not over fertilize with Nitrogen, or you will get a lot of leafy growth and few beans.

 

Where Can I Grow It?

Grow beans outdoors in a bright sunny location. It is best to directly sow seeds in the pot you want your beans to grow in, as they do not like having their roots disturbed.

 

Bean Growing Tips

Harvest beans while the seed pods are still immature. If the seeds in the pod have begun to bulge out, they are likely too mature and will have become woody and less tender.

Harvest often to keep the plant producing new beans.

 

Companion Planting

Grow beans alongside cucumbers, carrots, broccoli, corn, marigolds, mint, rosemary, strawberries, potatoes, or radishes as they grow well together and provide benefits to each other.

For example, potato plants are especially helpful to grow near or with beans as they repel bean beetles. Beans themselves are helpful to many of your other plants because beans have the ability to fix nitrogen in the soil, an important nutrient that all plants require.

Avoid planting near anything in the allium family, such as onions, chives, garlic or leeks, as well as hot peppers as they do not grow well together.