"Half runner" only describes the growth habit of the bean. There are a good many varieties of half runner beans. The two varieties of half runner which most readily come to mind are the NT half runner at Sustainable Mountain Agriculture, and Dutch White Half Runner.

George
Tahlequah, OK

Concur, the term is usually used for semi vining snap beans but there are dry type beans which also send out multiple short runners. Dixie, State, Mountain, Volunteer, Pink, Speckled, Brown, are popular snap half runners.

So is the term "cornfield" beans an Appalachian term for any kind of pole bean, or is it more specific than that?

Adding to plantslayer's question, are cornfield beans better adapted than other pole beans to growing in the shade of the corn?

Jim

"cornfield" beans are any bean that is commonly grown in a cornfield using cornstalks for support. Beans used this way are almost always very vigorous and productive varieties. It is often stated that they are more tolerant of shade but from my experience, it is not so much shade tolerance as it is that these beans grow so vigorously that they get up on top of the corn where they can get all the light they need. A better question might be to ask if cornfield beans can tolerate root competition better than other varieties. I believe they can but again it seems to be tied to plant vigor.

DarJones

Very good, insightful answer, Dar. Thanks.

Jim

Where do half runners fit into the cuisine? I've never grown or eaten them. How do you cook and serve them?

I acquired some seed of State Half Runner and will probably grow them this summer.

Jim

Most are used as snap beans. State is a good one for use as snap beans. Flavor is close to a pole bean. They do develop strings. As a dried bean they are more like a Navy bean, but it seems counterproductive to grow them for that purpose. I have never had a half runner and I have grown many of them. Nevrer have short vines over three feet. I grow in an open field without maximum enhancements or irrigation however.

We normally think of half runners as having vines that might barely make it to the top of a 6 foot trellis. Bill Best once said that he considers half runners to have short 10 foot vines as compared to normal pole beans that climb twice that.

I am growing NT Half Runner from seed I got from Bill and the vines are 8 feet so far and growing. - Dick

Questions about Half Runners. Going to try growing Mountaineer for the first time.

So Half Runners will grow longer vines if they have something to climb on, but will not send out long vines if they don't have something to climb on? Are they more productive when they can climb? Or it really doesn't matter, they just grow like they grow?

Are White Half Runner Beans like Mountaineer (Dutch) related to old types of cultivated P. vulgaris snap beans from early gardens that were later bred into stringless bush snap beans? So it has the strings and not quite bush nor runner habit, but has vigor and taste superior to bush beans? I've seen picked White Half Runners at a market, and they don't exactly look as good as average.

I have some good books, and they oddly do not even mention half runner beans. At first I assumed they were hybrids, like a common bean crossed with P. coccineus. Obviously wrong. I swear one seed company even has regular Runner Beans pictured on the packet.

Growth habit of half runners is genetically determined. For example, Striped Bunch will only climb 5 feet for me. They are not more productive when trellised, but there are fewer damaged beans than if they sprawl and they are easier to harvest. The problem with sprawling is that it leaves many of the beans in contact with soil. In a dry climate, that is not a major problem, but in a humid climate, most beans touching soil will be damaged by insects and/or diseases.

Half-runner beans are one of the original four types cultivated by Amerindians when white settlers first arrived. Here are the four types:

Type 1 - determinate bush (typical of the bush snap and shell beans)

Type 2 - Upright short vine (half-runner)

Type 3 - Indeterminate sprawling (many western varieties are in this group)

Type 4 - Indeterminate strong climber (most pole beans are in this group)

Half runners are not hybrids, in fact, there are to my knowledge no hybrid beans on the market today. All commercial beans are therefore open pollinated which means you can save seed to your heart's content. There is however a fairly consistent rate of cross-pollination in beans. If two compatible varieties of bean are planted close together, about 1 seed in 100 to 1 in 1000 will be crossed. To illustrate this, I deliberately interplanted Fortex pole beans with a highly disease and heat tolerant line from Colombia. When I grew the resulting seed, I got one hybrid plant out of about 300 seed sown. Bees did the work of making the cross for me.

There are 5 recognized species in Phaseolus: P. Acutifolius (tepary bean), P. Coccineus (runner bean), P. Lunatus (lima beans), P. Vulgaris (common bush/pole/sprawling beans), and P. Polyanthus (A rare type grown mostly in central America). As a general rule, species do not intercross with each other though crosses can often be made via embryo rescue. There are some very useful genes in one of the species but not in the others. This has resulted in several efforts to make crosses such as between Tepary and Vulgaris to bring disease tolerance into Vulgaris.

There are 5 subtypes of P. Vulgaris (common bean) each of which demonstrates
partial incompatibility with the other types. Light Red Kidney beans
for example don't play particularly well with the common snap pole beans
such as Fortex. Do a bit of delving and there will be a few articles talking about these 5 types and the genetic restrictions to crossing between them.

Now we can talk about White Half-runner beans. The original White Half-runners are thought to have been developed somewhere in the Appalachian mountains. They were commonly grown from Alabama through Tennessee into North Carolina, Kentucky, and West Virginia. Unfortunately, they were so successful that they attracted a great deal of effort to "improve" them by adding disease and pest tolerance. The result was to compromise the culinary traits of the original beans making them far less palatable. This caused several bean growers to go on a quest for seed of the original half-runners. Bill Best at http://www.heirlooms.org/ came up with NT Half-runner which appears to be closest to the original beans.

Thanks! Interesting information that I've not seen before. I've ordered some of Bill's half runners and will improvise some support with some metal pepper cages and twine, should keep the plants over the ground. Then in an other part of the yard I will have pole beans 'Rattlesnake' and 'Blauhilde' with more vertical space. And maybe a few 'King of the Garden' Lima.

I got a pack of white half runners in a trade. Will they cross with scarlet runners. Do they grow in cool weather like scarlet or hot like lima?

Im trying to find the southern string beans of my youth to long boil with potatoes and fat back.

1. Scarlet Runner is Phaseolus Coccineus, a different species that does not normally cross with Phasoleus Vulgaris

2. They do not like cool weather

3. They do not like very hot weather.

4. If you got them in a trade and they are not otherwise identified, it is probable that they are one of the modern breeding experiments that attempted to add disease tolerance. You probably won't like them.