I would be interested in trading for the following: Celery Tall Utah, White Icicle Radish and Mammoth Long Island Dill. Take a look at my list and see if there is anything that you are interested in.

A friend is trying to track down an old variety of french bean called Comtesse du Chambour or Chambourg. Does this name ring any bells for anyone? Raymond, I don't have the time to do extensive searchng but thought I'd give you some clues. I could not find it listed in my back SSE Yearbooks using the spelling you used. And did not go back to look after finding a different spelling. I did find it in the 1885 edition of Vilmorin, the venerable French seed firm, as follows: Haricot Comtesse de Chambord And that was indicated as being known in English as: Dwarf White Rice Kidney Bean Aside from a full description of this variety it's also noted that there is a version of it known as Haricot Nain de Hongrie , aka Dwarf Hungarian Kidney Bean, aka Hungarian Rice Kidney Bean. Vilmorin is available in reprint . At least your friend now has other words to use in an online search, or otherwise. Carolyn, who has done no further searching re the above so doesn't know what's in the back SSE Yearbooks or indeed online.

Ditto on Farmerdilla's comments. When we in the U.S. say "pole beans", "bush beans", "green beans", or "snap beans", we are generally referring to P. vulgaris. I often refer to them as "common beans", which is an English translation of the Latin vulgaris. In the U.K., they would be referred to as "French beans". Runner beans (P. coccineus) are mostly climbers, hence the name. There are only a few bush varieties. They are also good as snaps... in fact, "snap beans" in the U.K. are almost always runner beans. As Farmerdilla mentioned, runner beans thrive in cooler weather, where common beans struggle. In the U.S. they do well in the Pacific Northwest and areas with cool maritime climate. They do not like hot weather, so common beans are better for areas with warm summers. Some runner beans (especially white-seeded ones) are often misidentified as common beans or limas. When in doubt, observe the cotyledons (the seed halves). For runner beans, these stay below the ground during germination. The cotyledons emerge for common beans & limas.

Maybe it's grasshoppers. It's really so hard to just guess what it might be.