1. Poster advertising the Blue Peter Inn’s ‘Runner Bean Competitition’, Polperro, Cornwall, May 2018.  Entry fee £5; first prize £100, second £50, and third £25:  ‘World Record currently 4ft 3inch! Bonus prize if you beat the World Record!’

2. Taught to me by the farm manager when we lived at Rothamsted Experimental Station in Hertfordshire from 1958-60 … Fred Burton used to say ‘The 14th of May is runner bean day’, and I remind my husband every year as he rushes to plant them earlier! [Knaresborough, North Yorkshire, July 1997].

3. In our area the time to plant runner beans was 23 May [Lower Quinton, Warwickshire, October 1993].

4. [Ashford area, Kent] Runner beans planted on May Day [Bexhill-on-Sea, East Sussex, February 1991].

Images: main, cultivated, Queen Elizabeth Hall Roof Garden, Southbank Centre, London Borough of Lambeth, September 2015; lower inset, cultivated, The Black Country Living Museum, Dudley, West Midlands, September 2015.