New Soybean Variety Can be Tailored to Needs

September 13, 1999

A new edible soybean can be tailored to taste, needs and growing conditions. The vegetable soybeans or "jade peas" can be eaten just like green peas and seasoned to taste. The new soybean is BARC-18 and was bred at the Beltsville, MD, Agricultural Research Center by Agricultural Research Service geneticist Thomas Devine. The new soybean is source material for developing vegetable-type cultivars of superior vigor for a variety of local conditions.

Producers can use BARC-18 to develop individual lines of vegetable soybeans by selecting plants with suitable plant-growth characteristics and preferred eating qualities after growing selections for three generations.

After being boiled for about three minutes, the soybeans pop out of their pods and can be seasoned to taste, then eaten like green peas, Devine says.

He sent 300 seeds of the variety to more than 25 growers, along with detailed growing instructions and instructions on selecting offspring, preparing soil and cooking the beans.

BARC-18 has genes for exceptional plant height and vigor, large seed size, green seed coat and green embryo. It also has genes to resist lodging or toppling over from wind or rain. Devine developed the variety by crossing the vegetable-type soybean, Verde, with several forage-type soybeans.

It produces a wide variety of different plant types: tall and short, lodging resistant and viny, large and normal-sized seed, early and late maturing, green seeds and yellow or pale cream seeds.