With the intensity of a midwest summer, I'd say a full sun location for this plant is just a bit too severe. The brown leaves are sunburn/scorch. It is a woodland plant in its native habitat and a full sun exposure without copious amounts of water is expecting a bit much of it. It is best sited on an eastern or northern exposure in rich, well-draining but moisture retentive soil. Unless located in very heavy shade, you can expect reliable blooming once it is well enough established, which can take a number of years. Personally, I'd relocate it to a shadier location (morning sun, afternoon shade preferred) or provide some sort of protection until your shade fills in.

I am no expert.... But just how 'moist' is the soil underneath? It looks like it maybe could be that the roots are kept too moist. Does the frame you have on the concrete have really good drainage? Have you had a lot of rain? And unless it is an artifact of the photo, that soil looks really rich and black. Tomatoes like this. Beans, less so.

Had a lot of yellow leaves on my pole beans and very little production. Lacking something I suppose. First time for me growing pole beans.

Drloyd, the relationship between beans, inoculant, and fertilizer (particularly N fertilizer) has been discussed at length on several threads. Jimster & I have a running conversation on the subject for the past two years... and with Gardenlad, who I wish was still involved. One of the better threads is linked below, and there is yet another link (regarding soybeans) contained within that thread. For many years, I recommended the use of inoculant only for legumes, without fertilizer. It was my belief then - based upon anecdotal evidence & a few government reports - that legumes thus treated would produce all the nitrogen they needed, once the nodules were fully established. For some legumes, that may still be true. But several things since have given me cause to question that conclusion. One was my inoculant experiment last year, which while not fully conclusive, was not encouraging. Of the several legume species that I tested, only cowpeas showed a noticeable improvement when treated. This was confirmed again this year, when I rogued out several young cowpeas last week, and found the 6" plants already heavily nodulated. Suspecting that this ability to benefit from inoculant might extend to others in the Vigna genus, I heavily inoculated adzuki beans (Vigna angularis) this year. Pulling one up this week in the name of science, I found it heavily nodulated as well. I will try to post photos soon. Another influence for my change of opinion was a recent thread (I believe it was here on GW) that contained a link to a report on nodulation of various legumes. According to this report, common beans are some of the least efficient at developing nodules; and even when treated with inoculant, may not produce enough usable nitrogen to supply their needs. Observations by myself & several others, as to the scarcity of nodules on bean roots, seem to confirm this. This would explain the yellowing or weakness of bean seedlings observed by so many gardeners. So what about fertilizer? Beans will perform well without either inoculant or fertilizer, but they may not perform to their full potential. As a rule, weaker plants are more susceptible to disease, insects, and environmental stress. Sometimes what appears to be a disease problem, is in reality caused by a nutritional deficiency. The effect upon beans of over-fertilization is well established. They may not produce as much N as other legumes, but what they do produce still makes them sensitive to the presence of excess nitrogen. Lush foliage with little to no beans one of the most frequent complaints, and upon further examination, the cause is nearly always too much N applied to the soil. For my own part, I once dug in large quantities of horse manure to a previous garden, in the 80's. Although I did not notice it then, in retrospect my beans were very heavily foliated, and slow to bloom. I suspect that only as the nitrogen began to be depleted, halfway through the season, did they begin to blossom... but then bore well. It would seem logical that there must be a happy medium, somewhere between no fertilizer, and over fertilization. Given the differences in soil type & fertility, this would likely vary by location. It might even vary by variety, and I wonder if other species in the genus Phaseolus share the poor nodulation of P. vulgaris. If I can, I'll sacrifice a plant each of P. coccineus and P. lunatus for comparison. The recommendation that I make now is for a light application of N to common beans at the time of planting, with no further fertilization. Other legumes - particularly peas and Vigna beans - may not need this. It is too late for me to perform an experiment this year, but next year I will try to find some scientific proof that early fertilization is beneficial to beans. Here is a link that might be useful: Yellowing of beans