Valena Italian - Pole Green Bean - 1 oz - Heirloom, Open-Pollinated, non-Hybrid Victory Seeds®

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Home > Vegetable Seeds > Beans > Beans, Pole Green

'Valena Italian' pole beans at various stages.

Valena Italian Pole Green Bean

Item Id: 3030101

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Description

Valena Italian

75 to 90 days — This bean is a family heirloom that helped us start the Victory Seed Company. We released it to the public in our 1999 catalog. It was handed down to us years ago by Denise's maternal Grandfather, Emilio Valena of Petaluma, California. He was a first generation Italian-American whose relatives in Cino (Lombardy Region) Italy still grow this variety.

'Valena' is a dual-purpose (horticultural-type) pole bean that is used young as a green bean, at the green shelling stage, and mature as a dry bean. The pods are flat, green and tasty when young turning tan with maroon streaks as they mature. The seeds are large, egg-shaped and tan with darker brown streaks.

The vines need good, tall, strong support as they are very vigorous and very productive. This means they get really heavy towards September! In fertile soil, We have had then quickly top our six foot tall trellis system and double back down about half way. For a lot more information on pole bean support systems, click here.

Each packet contains one ounce, which is about 35 seeds.


We heard from a gardening friend in Canada about a variety called 'Kahnewake' bean whose seeds appear similar although the vines are reportedly shorter. The undocumented lore is that it arrived in "la Nouvelle-France" (New France) with the Jesuits. In trying to research that variety, its history is a bit elusive and the original source traced back to the Eastern Native Seed Conservancy (closed in 2007). In the 1931 publication called, "Beans of New York," a comprehensive and well researched catalog of all known bean varieties, a variety called simply 'Italian' is described and a picture of its seed is included. Although the seed looks similar, it is said to only grow to 4-1/2 feet tall.