Growing cucumbers?

level200

HI Guys

the wife has asked me to grow cucumbers in the garden next year, can anyone give me any advice or tips please.

Cheers
John

Jake'sGran

They are very easy to grow but I have only ever grown them in my potting shed. They like plenty of water. When they first start to show you need to remove the female ones but I think it is not necessary these days with certain seeds. Just had a look and there is a lot of info on the web. You can grow them outside apparently, seeds 8 - 10" apart. My best use for them was "bread and butter" pickle. I am a bit out of date with them but you will get more responses.

kimmee

Hi John

It's been my first year at growing cucs and I'm growing them outside in planters and first off I would say I am no expert!!. I suggest you don't sow them too early as they won't survive cold nights at all, can't remember when I sowed mine but it must have been about late April, germinated them indoors and kept them indoors until the temps had risen above 0 degrees at night. I them moved them into my little greenhouse during the day but brought them in at night for a few weeks. Then I left them in the greenhouse at night and finally planted them out into their final growing position about beginning of June.

I would say don't crowd them (lost a couple of mine) and when I transplanted them they all looked pretty poorly for a little while but I fed them and made sure I didn't overwater them. They have a trellis to grow up and I harvested my first cuc the other day, and got about 4 tiny babies on the way too.

Oh and make sure you get an outdoor variety - or else grow them in a greenhouse.

Good luck

Primrose

I suggest you try growing the Mini cucumbers which grow just a few inches long and are deliciously crisp and crunchy. They can be grown in a greenhouse or outdoors. I sow them from seed in mid/late April and plant them out into a well manured sunny border around mid June. They like the soil to be kept moist, with the leaves sprayed in hot dry weather. I have four plants and am hoping they will keep us supplied with mini cucumbers all through the summer now.

A._Badger

I've been growing Marketmore (an outdoor or 'ridge' type for a few years) and I'd say there are two prime requirements - a lot of water and a surprisingly high amount of food. I dig a hole about a foot square and fill it with a mixture of farmyard manue and soil, I add chicken manure pellets and even then, after a few weeks when cucumbers are forming, I give them a regular high potash liquid feed as well (Phostrogen, or Chempak tomato feed). red spider mite is, aparently, a problem, so it's recommended to spray the leaves with water at least once a day.

SallyForth_2

Jake'sGran wrote: »

They are very easy to grow but I have only ever grown them in my potting shed. They like plenty of water. When they first start to show you need to remove the female ones but I think it is not necessary these days with certain seeds. Just had a look and there is a lot of info on the web. You can grow them outside apparently, seeds 8 - 10" apart. My best use for them was "bread and butter" pickle. I am a bit out of date with them but you will get more responses.

If you remove the female flowers, you won't get any fruit!

tanith

I have an outdoor variety growing up sticks in a pot and its doing brilliantly so far, I have 2 already 3/4 ins and 3 more babies just starting out.. the only thing that is puzzling me is how long do I let them get as the weight is going to pull the plant down.. I did think to get some sort of net idea on each one to support the fruit.. oh its the first time I ever tried them by the way.. they seem easy peasy fingers crossed..

Primrose

The problem with growing the 'ordinary' cucumbers is that their weight can easily damage the plants as they grow bigger and it becomes difficult to find a way of supporting them in containers unless you can grow them up a fence trellis. With the Mini cucumber varieties, you don't let them grow longer than four or five inches, so support is less of a problem and I clip mine to a stout stick which is put into the ground at a 45 degree angle. Thus they are kept off the earth so that slugs don't damage the fruit or leaves.

Jake'sGran

SallyForth wrote: »

If you remove the female flowers, you won't get any fruit!

Yes, Sally, I should have read up on them first. I just know I was advised to remove something but then realised that these days this annoying procedure may have l have been bred out. My first cucumbers were good but just too much for two people.