It’s the Learning Garden Series, where we all hold virtual hands and learn a bit about the botany and agriculture of the plants that feed us, and our co-evolutionary history with them. The future of the human-Earth relationship depends on it. No big deal! :)
This week may have been the last harvest of Dragon Tongue beans for the year. The ones that survived the flood were tender, sweet, and crisp.
In honor of them, this week we are visiting with: THE BEAN FAMILY! Or, in scientific terms, Fabaceae. Sometimes referred to as the pea family. We’ll stick with “bean family” for now. I’ll focus here on the domesticated species we eat: Phaseolus vulgaris. From P. vulgaris we get most of the snap and dry bean varieties.
When it comes to the bean family, they don’t get together much outside of the holidays. Fabaceae is one of the most diverse families of plants. It contains many different subfamilies, and different tribes within those. Some members, like Black Locust, are trees. Some, like clover, are ground cover. A vining Hyacinth Bean full of shining purple seed pods is bending over on its trellis right now in front of the staff room entrance. There’s a member of Fabaceae for every niche.
We, however, came here for beans, hot beans. The magical fruit.
Domesticated beans originated from indigenous farmers of Mesoamerica, just like squash, corn, tomatoes, peppers, potatoes, and so many more. While we modern humans can only imagine what life was like 10,000 years ago when beans were first being selectively bred for greatness, we can learn from the descendants of the people who saved those seeds. With 60-80% of the farmworkers in America having been born in Mexico, the descendants of those ancient farmers are are still feeding the world today, albeit in a way that ancient farmers probably never intended.
Those of us who aren’t growing acres of GMO soybeans are spoiled, since we get to focus on the culinary varieties. Usually just your odd green bean, yellow bean, purple bean that turns green in the pan (royal burgundy), or dragon tongues. They are generally easy to grow, and labor-intensive to harvest.
They are worth it, not only as a food rich in vitamins and minerals, but for nitrogen fixation. Bean family plants form symbiotic relationships with soil microbiota to sequester nitrogen from the air and release it in the soil as nutrients for plants.
If you read last week’s post, or remember 3rd grade science, you’d be familiar with the nitrogen cycle. The bean family has the ability to “fix” nitrogen by removing it from the air, with the help of some bacterial partners. This is one of a few critical ways that soil absorbs nitrogen. That’s why bean family plants make great groundcovers. They provide fertility to the soil and nourish soil microbiota when used in rotation with other less generous crops.
There was a long-held theory by botanical archeologists that the two main species that represent our domesticated beans were bred around the same time in two separate locations: Mexico and middle America, and the Andes region. Recent DNA evidence suggests, however, that the two were both from a common ancestor from modern-day Ecuador, before spreading in opposite directions.
If you look at the spread of these domesticated beans on a map next to, say, a map of archeological sites from that time, it looks like a map of human migration. Humans, and their beans, moving together, in opposite directions. Likely migrating for the same reasons that people always have: climate, conquest, or escaping the conquest.
The Fall of Civilizations podcast is one of my favorite historical podcasts to listen to while seeding in the greenhouse. Two episodes in particular bring this time period and place to life. Each episode is a masterpiece, and the ones about the Mayan and Aztec empires are worth checking out. These ancient Mesoamerican peoples were inventive, agricultural geniuses. The Aztecs, for example, created chinampas, or floating gardens, to negotiate the wet area they settled in.
While it’s worth celebrating the workers and average citizens of these empires, whom were accomplished in their field - empires gonna empire. There are a lot of dismal lessons to learn from the interconnected fall of the Mayan and Aztec empires. A story as old as time really:
A man, who’s been in power too long, gets greedy and makes enemies of all the neighboring territories. They are all to eager to get revenge for their loved ones, their burned towns, their starving kids. The Spanish show up, diseases in tow, and promise payment to take down their long-held enemy.
The result in this case is that there is no Mayan or Aztec empire anymore, only Mayan and Aztec people.
When these empires fell, the population dropped heavily and spread out from the cities, leaving the ruins studied today. All those who survived colonization by the Spanish would have carried with them memories, traditions, and stories of their culture, as well as horrors of loss.
We now understand more than ever that catastrophic events live on in our DNA, too. Modern geneticists have found the link between trauma and DNA. The study of epigenetics, or how genes behave in response to their environment, has given rise to an understanding that some human experiences are so profoundly harmful that they can change not only your own life outcomes, but also that of your children AND your children’s children. A severe starvation event, wounding, or loss of ones’ loved ones, community, and home can all be encoded on DNA. It’s the body trying to adapt to the conditions it’s in, just like beans adapting to severe draught or disease.
Forms of inherited trauma can contribute to disorders related to mood, eating, sleeping, and memory. There are also physical affects, such as a higher risk of certain diseases like diabetes, heart attack, and stroke.
We millennials, and as eldest daughters, have heard one thing a lot when it comes to this topic: “Break the cycle of trauma. It stops with You.” We are often the first generation of women in our family to be able to either have a child out of wedlock freely, or get an abortion. A lot of us were (or would have been ;) the first women in our family to go to college. We had more opportunities to build a life for ourselves.
But here’s my question: what if we aren’t able to stop it at us? What if it’s in our blood to lock the door three times, jump-scare at every rustle in the bushes, cry when our kid won’t eat, and then overindulge in something that makes us sick? What if we yell, run behind, forget, or shut down? What if we, Dog forbid, get ***TRIGGERED***?
For what it’s worth, none of us are alone. Most people experience traumatic events in their lives. Many experience PTSD as a result. Some might change their life path, behavior, or beliefs. They might reach out for support, or they might isolate. All of these responses are valid, and often come from a place of protection and survival.
Like beans, which now come in a rainbow of different colors, sizes, and textures, we are also shaped by the conditions in which we are living. We now know, more than ever, that our DNA was not born yesterday. It remembers lives we didn’t live. I wonder if the beans could remember the fall of the Aztec and Mayan empires, in a way that our brains could never.
Hungry Coyote, or Nezahualcoyotl did remember, because he lived it. He was a ruler within the Aztec empire in the 15th century, right around when the Spanish started taking over. He was famous for his poetry, including an oral tradition called Flower Songs. These were rhythmic poems about life, death, profanity, and humor told in highly specific and mysterious metaphors, characterized by improv, in conversation with the audience. Imagine listening to these flower songs, sharing a pot of beans, and recovering from a full day’s journey around a fire.
During a MKE Queer Choir session, my friend Ousia shared a song that I often sing to myself. It’s not a flower song, but it does feel good to sing. It goes:
“Will there be
Singing
Still
In the dark times?
Yes, there will still be singing.
Yes, there will still be singing
about the dark times.”
The song comes from a poem by Bertolt Brecht, and arranged by Alexandra Blakely.
Thank you for reading and beaning with me!
SOURCES/FURTHER READING:
https://www.pulsesincrease.eu/fr/crops/common-bean
https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspb.2022.1078#:~:text=10.1098/rspb.2022.1078-,Abstract,investigations%20on%20the%20regional%20level.
BOTANY IN A DAY by Thomas J. Elpel
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3325731/
https://www.missouribotanicalgarden.org/