Just looks like environmental damage to me - sun scorch and/or wind burn on the old leaves. Bean leaves are very prone to it. New growth looks fine. Don't see any insect damage on this plant but am curious as to why they are apparently planted so far apart and with all the weeds?

Dave

they are planted in rows abt 15" apart and the plants within a row are planted abt 15" apart..........that's what my old seed packet instructed me to do - no idea why, that's not the norm. The new one says 3" apart, so I intend to plant 2 seeds in between each of the curent plants. Maybe the spacing is what caused that last year, if it is indeed sunburn. Whatever it is, it stunted all of them last year. Some of the plants have holes in them or the bottom half of the leaves chewed off, must be bugs. I never see anything on them though, perhaps it is happening at night?

As far as the weeds, i weed them once a week, cannot get rid of these things, whatever they are, they grow like a carpet and keep coming no matter what. they are robbing my beans!.
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My beans looked like that last year too, and they produced very well. Thanks for telling us what it is, Dave.

15"? Must have been a misprint on the package!

The weed looks like purslane. You should eat it :)

Here is a link that might be useful: purslane recipes

yes, Dave hit the nail on the head with that, I was sure it was a virus. googled it, found this article with pics:

http://www.ppdl.purdue.edu/PPDL/hot07/7-12.html

Hmmmm........it does look like purslane, but how can I be sure?

Does more frequent watering help? I like the book Square Foot Gardening that encourages people to plant a little more densely than the package does. Two rows of bush beans can be 6" apart. You can still easily harvest the plants. Three rows means the middle row is harder to reach. In a small patch, you could plant every seed 3-4" apart. One year I had a wonderful harvest from a 3x3' square bed.

One of the problems with weeds is that mother nature doesn't like bare soil. I've done things like plant cucumbers around young blueberrie bushes. I don't usually mulch but that might help. I think when you leave so much ground bare, you are just inviting weeds and wasting good growing space. The other thing is that I rarely see a decent hand weeder for sale in regular garden centers, only the more upscale ones. I have what was originally called a Cape Cod weeder. Only thing similar I have seen advertised is a Cobra head weeder. Mine is an "L" shaped blade I can scrape thru the top 1/2 inch or so of soil. This gets a lot of the little roots just pulling doesn't get. I also wear the rubber coated cheap gloves from the farm and feed store that gives me a better grip. I cover walkways with layers of newspaper covered with grass clippings. Sometimes I edge the beds this way too. With a larger, more open space between rows that you have, you might try a scuffle hoe. Good luck!

That's a heck of a lot of portulaca competing with your bean plants. I suggest you weed more than once a week so that you can get control of it.