Pole beans up close

First crop of pole beans.

First blooms

First bean

First harvest

First "mess" of green beans. They turned out delicious

except that I let them get too big and they had the

strings of old-fashioned string beans. I learned to pick

them earlier. In cooking them, I like to keep them a bright green so they don't get mushy. I acknowledge that this picture is at an odd angle. I really don't cook on a slope. It is very flat here.