Author Topic: A mystery  (Read 3250 times)

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Offline Eric Hardy

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A mystery
« on: May 16, 2009, 06:15:14 PM »
Can anyone explain this please? On Thursday I looked at our runner beans. They are doing well and were up their canes about a couple of feet or more having wound themselves completely around about four times. Yesterday I check again and four of them had completely unwound themselves and were lying horizontal along the ground. I wound them carefully back on their supports and today they are fine. There is no access to the rear garden except through locked doors so no children about to play a prank.  ??? I have never had this happen before

Eric H

Offline Lyn and Malcolm

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Re: A mystery
« Reply #1 on: May 16, 2009, 07:30:59 PM »

Could it have been the wind, or short of water. Other than that I have no idea.
You said they had wound themselves, round the sticks, so it couldn't have been that you wound them round the wrong way.

I give up  ;D

Malcolm

Online ideasguy

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Re: A mystery
« Reply #2 on: May 16, 2009, 08:27:16 PM »
Magic goats, now we have magic beans  ::)

Offline Eric Hardy

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Re: A mystery
« Reply #3 on: May 16, 2009, 09:46:59 PM »
They had wrapped themselves round the right way, Malcolm, anticlockwise. They had had plenty of water and although there had been some wind they are in a very sheltered spot. Why four of them chose to do this will remain a mystery. They weren't even next to each other but scattered along the row. As George says. Magic beans  ; :)

Incidentally, why DO they climb anticlockwise? So does bindweed and we have that in our gooseberry bushes at the moment and we can't do much about it  >:(

Eric H

Offline Palustris

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Re: A mystery
« Reply #4 on: May 17, 2009, 09:35:47 AM »
The growing tip follows the sun around the sky.

Offline Eric Hardy

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Re: A mystery
« Reply #5 on: May 17, 2009, 03:51:59 PM »
Ah but it doesn't, Eric, sorry. If you look down on top of the stake the sun revolves clockwise but the bean goes the opposite direction, anti-clockwise  ::). That is what I don't understand!

Just to be different Honeysuckles go clockwise.

I found this on the internet. It doesn't answer my question but might amuse  :)

The fragrant honeysuckle spirals clockwise to the sun, 
   And many other creepers do the same. 
   But some climb anti-clockwise, the bindweed does, for one, 
   Or Convolvulus, to give her proper name. 
     
   Rooted on either side a door, one of each species grew, 
   And raced towards the window-ledge above. 
   Each corkscrewed to the lintel in the only way it knew, 
   Where they stopped, touched tendrils, smiled, and fell in love. 
     
   Said the right-handed honeysuckle to the left-handed bindweed, 
   "Oh, let us get married, if our parents don't mind, we'd 
   Be loving and inseparable, inextricably entwined, we'd 
   Live happily ever after" said the honeysuckle to the bindweed. 
     
   To the honeysuckle's parents it came as a shock. 
   "The bindweeds," they cried, "are inferior stock! 
   They're uncultivated, of breeding bereft, 
   We twine to the right and they twine to the left." 
     
   Said the anti-clockwise bindweed to the clockwise honeysuckle, 
   "We'd better start saving, many a mickle macks a muckle, 
   Then run away for a honeymoon and hope that our luck'll 
   Take a turn for the better" said the bindweed to the honeysuckle. 
     
   A bee who was passing remarked to them then, 
   "I've said it before and I'll say it again, 
   Consider your offshoots, if offshoots there be, 
   They'll never receive any blessing from me". 
     
   "Poor little sucker, how will it learn, 
   When it is climbing, which way to turn? 
   Right, left, what a disgrace, 
   Or it may go straight up and fall flat on its face!" 
     
   Said the right-hand-thread honeysuckle to the left-hand-thread bindweed, 
   "It seems they're against us, all fate has combined. 
   Oh my darling, oh my darling, oh my darling Colombine, 
   Thou art lost and gone forever, we shall never intertwine". 
     
   Together, they found them, the very next day, 
   They had pulled up their roots and just shrivelled away. 
   Deprived of that freedom for which we must fight, 
   To veer to the left or to veer to the right! 


Eric H


 

Offline roiphil

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Re: A mystery
« Reply #6 on: May 18, 2009, 09:38:21 PM »
Magic goats, now we have magic beans  ::)

wasn't me, i wasn't there, honest guvnor  ;D