Thanks, Donna. It's very possible the container-grown beans haven't been getting enough water. I've never grown them in containers before, and these were definitely an afterthought--and an impulse. I was thinning the ones I planted in the ground, and when I saw the complex root systems on the little plants I hated to throw them out. So I filled the only available container with potting mix and gave them a second chance. I would say they're doing susprisingly well, considering. I'll be more attentive to their water needs. I hope the yellow leaves are what you think they might be. Malica, I'm picking off more than you, but it's still not what I'd call bad. Bluebirdie, thanks! I'm very pleased with my bean arch. I found examples of these on these forums, first in a thread called something like "Show us your trellis" on the Peas & Beans forum, and then from there to another long thread in the Vertical Gardening forum. I was determined to make one for myself, so I bought the cattle panel and the posts.....and then persuaded my son to put it up for me. :-) It was easy, though, and not expensive--less than $35 total. The arch is 8 ft. high, so we can easily walk through it. I'm curious why the beans closer to the house have grown at a much faster rate than those on the other side of the arch. Must have something to do with the movement of the sun.

This year I'm trying a new thing - no mulch around the beans. The voles love the mulch, and they avoid open areas. So far so good, but it's hard to know what the pressure is this year. It feels very wrong not to have mulch and makes watering and weeding frustrating, but at least the plants are living. I have also used small water bottles with the bottoms cut off and slit up the side to cover over the bottom of the vines (worked reasonably well, but sometimes they would just snip off the top above the water bottle). I string natural twine for the beans to climb up and use bicycle spokes as garden stakes for them, but it doesn't seem to matter to the voles to have the stakes in the ground. I think that was because they just travelled under the mulch, above the soil. When I use traps I always catch at least one unwanted creature - even with traps right in tunnels and covered. There's a brown wren around here that really likes to go into tunnels and it makes me so sad to trap one that I have stopped trapping. Sometimes if I get the timing right, during a winter thaw the tunnels are very visible and I can trap some voles then - they are more desperate for the bait in the traps in winter, as well. But I'm not sure how much good winter trapping does, since more probably just move in during springtime. One last thing I tried - pile up deer netting all around the base of the plants, like a huge tangle. It seemed to make the voles reconsider entering the area.

It might be deer. I have had deer eat all the leaves off my pole beans on the side facing the fence. Not to worry, if they haven't eaten the vines the leaves grow back and flowering continues with beans galore.

No pesticides. I live in the country, far from poisons, and the rest of surrounding plants are fine.