How to grow broad beans

Inspired by a helpful YouTube guide. This walk-through draws on the popular video "How to Grow Broad Beans: From Sowing Autumn and Spring" by no-dig gardening expert Charles Dowding, who compares autumn and spring sowings side by side in his own kitchen garden. His channel is one of the best practical gardening resources around.

1. Decide: autumn or spring sowing

Autumn sowing (late October to November) gives you an earlier, heavier crop. The plants overwinter as sturdy seedlings and come away fast in spring. The catch is that a very hard winter can knock back poorly drained plants, and pigeons may raid them when other food is scarce.

Spring sowing (February to April) is simpler and almost as good. You miss the very earliest harvest but you have fewer worries about frost and pest damage. Either works. Many gardeners do both.

2. Sow into modules or direct

Broad beans are big enough to handle individually, which makes them easy to sow. For autumn or very early spring, sow into deep root trainers or 9cm pots on a cool windowsill or in a cold greenhouse — this gives you more control over germination.

From February onward, sow direct outdoors in double rows about 20cm apart, with seeds placed every 20cm and about 5cm deep. Firm the soil well over them. Germination typically takes one to two weeks in cold soil.

3. Provide cane and string supports

Broad beans can reach over a metre tall and they fall over without support. Push canes in at each corner of the bed and run two or three lines of string around the outside as the plants grow. This is quicker than staking individual plants and does the job just as well.

Keep the supports slightly shorter than the plants will eventually reach, adding another line of string as needed. They need to be firm — a row of heavy-podded plants in a summer breeze pulls harder than you would expect.

4. Pinch out the growing tips

Once the lowest pods start to form, snap off the growing tip of each plant — about the top 10cm. This serves two purposes: it redirects energy into pod development, and it removes the part of the plant that blackfly (black bean aphid) colonises first. Blackfly infestations on the soft tips are almost inevitable without this step.

You can eat the tips if they are young and tender — tossed in butter they are surprisingly good.

5. Water during flowering and pod fill

Broad beans are fairly drought-tolerant early on, but once the flowers open and pods start to swell, a good soak every week makes a real difference to yields. Dry weather during pod fill results in smaller, tougher beans.

That said, waterlogged soil kills the roots. Raise the bed slightly if drainage is poor, or build in some grit before sowing.

6. Harvest when pods are plump

Pick when the pods feel well-filled but before they go rubbery. Press the pods — you should feel the individual beans but the pod should still have some give. Left too long, the beans develop a dark line around the skin and become mealy rather than creamy.

Picking regularly encourages the plant to keep producing from the lower nodes. Eat them fresh if you can. Freshly shelled broad beans are in an entirely different league from anything out of a tin.

When to call a handyman

Broad beans are a straightforward DIY crop. If you need raised beds constructed, a vegetable patch dug out, or help putting in cane supports for a larger growing area, Richard is happy to assist with the practical side.