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After a slow start my runner beans are finally off and away and are producing a late but very welcome crop. At the start of the season I wondered if they were going to get past the first post (or up the first foot or so of cane actually). Slugs

by growing some of their favourite plants: cosmos, sunflowers, candytuft, lupins and foxgloves. And blackfly also love nasturtiums, so if you plant them around your broad, runner and French beans, they'll act as a 'sacrificial crop', suffering the onslaught

'Estampes', 'Marine De Chioggia'Runner beans; 'Painted Lady', 'Hestia'French bean 'Cosse Violette'

called ‘Mayan Twilight’, which is reputed to be closer to the original form of potato than most. The potatoes look great and I got a good-sized crop, but I haven’t eaten it yet, so the jury is still out.My runner beans have also been a runaway success

keen vegetable gardener and he grows tomatoes and cucumbers in his greenhouse. These and runner beans are his particular passions. Over tea we've compared seed companies and their service, our favourite varieties and tips on when to harvest runner beans

next year. So here are my allotment New Year resolutions for 2009:I must grow crops that don't require regular picking as I don't live close enough to the plot to get there more than a couple of times a week. That's just not enough to harvest runner

, on the other side of me, has a veritable riot of sweet peas rambling all over a bamboo cane plant support. My plot might be lush and colourful with runner bean blooms and courgette flowers, but it does lack that splash of summery colour. Besides which, a few