CHAPTER VI
BEANS
Planting Beans
Bean planting followed immediately after squash planting.
Beans were planted in hills the size and shape of squash hills, or about seven by fourteen inches; but if made in open ground the hills were not placed so far apart in the row. Squash hills, like corn hills, stood about four feet apart in the row, measuring from center to center; but bean hills might be placed two feet or less in the row.
Beans, however, were very commonly planted not in open ground, but between our rows of corn; the hills were arranged as shown in diagram ([figure 8, page 25]).
Corn hills, I have said, stood four feet, or a little less in the row, and the rows were about four feet apart,[17] when corn was planted by itself. But if beans were to be planted between, the corn rows were placed a little farther apart, to make room for the bean hills.
Putting in the Seeds
To make a hill for beans, I broke up and loosened the soil with my hoe, scraping away the dry top soil; the hill I then made of the soft, slightly moist under-soil. The hill, as suggested by the measurements, was rather elongated.
I took beans, three in each hand, held in thumb and first two fingers, and buried them in a side of the hill, two inches deep, by a simultaneous thrust of each hand, as I stooped over; the two groups of seeds were six inches apart.
I have heard that some families planted four seeds in each group, instead of three; but I always put in three seeds and think that the better way. [Figure 24] will explain the two ways of planting.