Hawaiian Landrace Limas

Just harvested my first beans from the Hawaiian landrace lima bean vines. As you may recall, I planted 11 beans in one of the greenhouses. That was way back on July 7th. Some seeds didn't germinate because they were old, so I ended up with 6 robust plants.

Those 6 plants took ever the entire 10' by 20' greenhouse. You talk about being an aggressive vine! I could have been more attentive and trained the vines better, but after harvesting the other limas on the left hand side of the greenhouse, I took the lazy approach and let the Hawaiian limas on the righthand side just cross over the ceiling and take over the lefthand side as well. 

So it took 6 1/2 months before the first pods dried down for harvest. Wow, that's a heck of a long time.

The pods I harvested contained 2 to 3 beans. 

In addition, this variety to big on growing leaves and vine, but very skimpy on producing pods. There's not many pods on these monster sized plants, at least not what one would expect as compared to other lima varieties. 

But the variety is unique. The lima beans are very interesting to look at. Large. Not all that plump. Longer than wide. Beautifully marked with black and white. It's the color and markings that I find intriguing. 

So pretty! 

If I were growing this to be a staple crop, I'd need to grow acres of them because of the poor yield. Other limas are far more productive. But I still like this variety. I think that I'll continue to grow it. It will be a novelty crop, rather than a staple.