My friend was examining her bean seedlings the other day and found one growing upside down eg roots growing through the top of the soil and when she emptied it out for a closer look, stem and leaves growing straight down where the roots should have been. She said it was a really horrid, freakish thing and immediately put it in the bin. All the bean seeds were planted in peat pots and appropriate compost, kept in the greenhouse. All other seedlings were normal. Has anyone come across this ? And what would have caused it ? Thanks.

Planting it upside down? ;-)

Basically the main bit of the bean is the cotyledons or 'seed leaves' which provide a food source until the bean is established. The business end of the bean is where the scar is, where the bean was attached to the pod. The bean has a means of detecting up and down, presumably gravity or moisture based, since beans grown in jam jars with an inner core of blotting paper grow the right way, so it can't be a light sensitivity mechanism. If there's a stone or lump of soil in the way, roots and leaves may get pushed in the wrong direction for a short time until they can manage to go in the direction that they want.

Every so often I find one with roots poking through the surface - they usually right themselves in due course.

But if I had bothered to uproot one, I would simply repot it the other way up.

The cause is that the bean seed is sewn upside down, they should be sewn with the eye down ( the brown bit (hinge side ) on the bottom, I have literally sewn thousands of them and have never had a problem with this kind of thing, best luck in the future

luvlyboy