Cucumbers 2010

The frost free window last season was just over 60 days and cucumber production was not too good last year. Early attempts at transplanting did not fare well. Changes or new ideas for 2010 cucumber planting are: (1) Grow some baby bush type in a covered raised bed, and (2) use a double cover (milk jug & 5-gal plastic pail) at night for early row transplants. Another consideration is trellising. Clouches don't work very well in our occasional extreme wind conditions, and this fikel weather we are having, I am trying to rethink my cucumber seed selections for next season as well. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Sounds like you need a really strong greenhouse. Even here, where I don't think we have your wind, I have known greenhouses to blow away, so they have to be well attached.

Is 60 days common? Or was it just a really bad year? Do you grow them for slicing or pickling? "Little Leaf" is a good plant for pickles - its not a bush, but the vines aren't huge either.
Buy a package of wall-o-waters for a test. Put them over your cukes 2/3 full with the tops closed for 2-3 weeks before your frost date. On your frost date - or any day that is supposed to get hot - fill them up so the tops stand open. Leave them past your frost date just in case - if a frost is predicted, squeeze the top to drop the water level and close them. Take them off when the plants out-grow them. The larger the vine, the quicker they outgrow them (2 weeks for pumpkins).
W-o-w's won't work in the fall. Wet plants tolerate frost better than dry ones. Frost blankets come in a range of ratios of light transmission versus frost protection. Don't confuse a lightweight floating row cover with a frost blanket (like I did). I have seen pictures of Christmas lights under a hoop-type frost cover.
I have trouble with wind, too. I have grown vines on the chain-link fence, then put the blanket over that, and clothes-pinned it to the fence. It was so-so, I don't think it would work in a strong wind. Hoops are supposed to be a good shape for wind, I haven't tried them yet. I have wondered if the Christmas light would still help a little without something to hold in the heat.

I have never been able to WOWs to stand up for more than a few minutes. I am personally challenged in that dept. I fear.

If there are 2 tubes punctured on the same side, they fall over - keep them away from puppies and tools with tines. If the ground is too uneven, I suppose they would probably fall over. The directions say to set them up around a 5-gallon bucket. I use a upside-down flower-pot with sloping sides, it already has the right shape and doesn't seem to knock them over as much as I pull it out. They are more stable when they are 2/3 full and conical than they are at 9/10 full and cylindrical.

I prefer to set them up on the lawn while sitting on a lawn chair, rather than bending over for long periods, and getting the garden bed muddy and compacted. I use the kind old-fashioned brass nozzle that is in line with the hose and will fit inside the tubes. Then I grab the top in my fist and move them to the garden - for this you have to have the conical flower pot - they don't want to go back down over a bucket with straight sides. I admit, this moving them around would probably drive most people insane, but I've done it for years.

They work best with tomatos, but I have tried them with all my frost-tender stuff.

The photo is just for illustration purposes to show the size and shape of the pot and nozzle, I don't actually set them up in January.

This message was edited Jan 15, 2010 10:58 AM

Thanks for the advice. I doubt if mine have holes since they have only been struggled with, not used. I remember the part about using a bucket. So what I gather is that you fill them then move them to the location where you plan to plant the tomato. I think one mistake I was making was trying to fill them at a windy community garden on the side of a hill where there were no chairs of any sort. Now I have a yard to garden in, maybe I will give them another try.
I also learned that I can get a crop here in New Mexico if I plant them May 15 without walls of water. But I suspect WOWs would hurry them along.

I pick a warm day, and fill up however many I will need over the next 1-2 weeks - all in a row on the lawn. Then I carry them one by one, either by gathering up the top into a bunch, or sometimes by grabbing opposite sides, to the garden which is near the lawn. I plan on getting wet (especially if someone is helping me). I usually let the w-o-w and the soil warm up for 1-2 days before planting. Then I move them off & back on again when I plant. I don't think this is what the directions say - I think you are supposed to plant, put the bucket over it, fill up the tubes, then leave it alone. But I move mine, and having that shape of pot instead of a bucket really helps. Planting on a windy hill would be a problem - if the bucket/pot doesn't want to sit level and stay put, then the wall-o-water won't either.

Blossoms won't set fruit here during the hot part of the summer. I need to get plants up to blooming size before then by any method that will work. Sitting out a big transplant on May 15th would work, but an early transplant might have more blossoms.

Well, Morgan, this is a surprise. We had loads of cucumbers last summer. From seed. Mostly late in the season.
[Goes and looks at seed packets.]
OK, we've got "Double Yield Cucumber" from Seed Savers Exchange and something called "Muncher" from American seed. I'll ask DH which he used last summer.

Your place must be quite a lot windier than ours here in town. Would that make a big difference?

Ah, the Wall Of Water...The precursor of so many great ideas. This is what led me to idea of double caging tomato plants for next season. So often a solution to a problem is right under you nose and you just don't see it. Your comments on the WOW got me to thinking about some pepper cages I made and abandonded in favor of a wall of straw around my pepper plants next season. These small welded wire cages would be perfect for starting early cucumber transplants. They are just the right size for a 5-gallon pail to fit over the top for a night time cover.

The 60 frost free days last season was the results of a late frost around mid-June and an early frost in mid-August. The first of June to the end of August are typically safe, but no guarantee. It was recently pointed out to me that zones are more for perenials than vegetables and that has made me stop and think about the diversity of weather along the northern states as well as the Rockies. Even here in Helena there are very distinct differences. My brother & sister-in-law live half way up a mountain pass and can't get anything to grow, and even if they did the deer would get to their fruits of labor first. Picante here lives at the base of a mountain and has a nice big fence too. Her winds might be 7 to 8 mph, and by the time they reach mid-valley the flag is standing straight out!

After attending Picantes husband's birthday party, the wife and I talked about a privacy fence around the garden, but that idea got vetoed for various reasons. I have plans for building a hoop house and placing it adjacent too and west of my shed. Using various means of anchorage maybe it won't blow away, but that's a tall maybe.

I liked your idea about the 'frost blanket' pollengarden. Those could work well for several plants including sprawling indet. tomato plants. Is this a commercailly available item, or are we talking about army surplus blankets, or what? Also, sitting out a 'big' transplant'. Tell us more about that method. I have had more failures than successes with cucumber transplants, but I'm still going to continue trying to do cucumbers initially as a transplant. Last season, like Julie, my cukes were all from direct seeding, the results of failed transplants. My best luck with cucumber transplants has been with the 4-inch peat pots, leaving the plants in the pots when transplanting. I make sure the pots are completely burried when transplanting. I will more than likely go back to that method for a mid-May transplanting attempt, using the methods we have discussed so far. However, I am open to any and all suggestions regarding transplanting cucumbers.

One of the cucumber varieties I was leaning towards for trellising was the Marketmore. I have never tried this particular seed before and I am basing my decision strictly on what I have read in the catalogs concerning cool climate varieties. We do both slicers for fresh eating and picklers, making as much relish as we can, a big favorite among the seven families we provide for. The covered raised bed (4' x 8') idea was for possibly 6 to 8 bush type plants for early eating slicers with salads. Our garden production comes in way to late for spring salads, so almost all of the garden production goes into canning. Obviously a hoop house opens up a greater range of possiblity for a number of plants including some large potted cucumbers.

And whats the big deal with 'burpless' varieties...just slicers without as much gas? Maybe I should start eating burpless cukes with my fire-in-the-hole chili to mellow out the after affects!

I used to live in North Dakota - I get my short season seeds and season extenders from:

http://www.johnnyseeds.com/ (But I haven't bothered to shop around)

Bigger transplants work best for slower growing things that transplant well - like tomatos - and not as well with fast growing vines. If you are already using big peat pots, you may already have gone as far as you can in that direction. Even with tomatos there is some transplant shock, and there is a sulking delay between the buds/blossoms/fruit they've already got and any new ones. Since I am trying to get the blossoms to beat the heat, not the fruit to beat the frost, that is a concern.

I have never figured out the difference between burpless slicers and other slicers either. The difference between picklers and slicers I understand - it is a matter of texture cooked/raw.

I get my cucumber seed from Johnny's also. I buy Little Leaf and Diva - Diva is a very good slicer, but expensive - and last year my old seed didn't sprout.

check out the winter sowing forum.
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/f/coldsow/all/
I've planted out stuff in Feb/Mar, directly into the ground and covered it with a gallon milk jug (bottom cut off & no top) and it worked great! Our ground doesn't freeze solid here though. The regular winter sowing with the jugs that they talk about on that forum and then transplanting might work well in your colder climate.

DenverJude - I have never been that brave! but I may have to try it. By February we are past our lowest lows. In fact, it might be a good use for old 2008-2009 seed. I already have it on hand, and if I manage to kill it, it is no great loss.

What do you do about the freak 20F on April 20th? and the freak snow on May 20th? are they still small enough to fit under their covers?

^ yup!
I've only ever done perennials (all baby transplants) and some cosmos from seed. I don't know what veggies would do, but I'd assume that they sprout and build good roots during that time like the rest of the stuff has done. Penn and Cord Parmenter start tomato seeds and small transplants under jugs and hoop houses in March in the south central mountains and they do great there. I took their class on sustainable greenhouse design over a year ago and Penn went into great detail about planting under jugs outside (mini greenhouse) and starting seeds indoors, etc.

I grew burpless cucs for DH as he is burpy. He said they made him less burpy but not unburpy. They are yummy tasting though but then all fresh cucs taste yummy to me.

I think a lot of cucumbers have the burpless gene in them these days. I have had trouble with burping from cucumbers long ago, but I think I ate an awful lot of them that time. Have been fine ever since. I do not eat a lot of cucumbers though -- maybe deep in my brain something is saying "watch out, watch out". I usually grow them and give them away. I do eat a few though.

I was 'Stumble.com ing' and came across a 'fart' page that said which foods caused the most gas. The average person passes gas 14 times a day. Odor is determined by how long in the colon and what gasses are produced. Termites emit more flatulance than any other creature on the planet Earth. Kind of interesting talking ' Burpee'. LOL

Termites emit more gas than cows? Cattle are supposed to be very gassy, at both ends.

termites fart under ground I guess. Imagie the methane pockets that must be building up under old buildings...

No wonder everyone is always so hell-bent on exterminating termites.

Eating wood products causes a lot of methane output. I personally don't like wood so I don't pass methane. No termites have 10 times the output of all the cows according to the Fart site.

Maybe the Fartsite is full of it.

Don't you know that everything on the internet is true? LOL At least I know that global warming is not due to Man. Darn Termites!

Sounds like an alternate fuel source to me. We should harness the power of cattle and termites, then - to misquote Monty Python - fart in the general direction of foreign oil.

Going back to the question.
I have found three short season cucumbers.

Morden Early

Early Russian says 50-70 days

Early Mincu says 65 - 75 days

Hopefully, these will give good production in our short season.

I've heard that about termites before too - on PBS. Termites were stated to produce 70% of the total methane given off by all creatures.

Well, we are just going to live with them, because millions of exterminators armed with deadly chemicals have been doing their best to exterminate them for my entire lifetime and as far as I can tell they have completely failed. Perhaps instead of exterminating we should see if we could herd them into giant barns, with huge methane collecting vents, and put all our tree trimmings and old bits of lumber in their with them. Then we can burn termit farts instead of fossil fuels. That is MY IDEA all in case the Nobel committee is reading this thread.

That is an excellent idea, Paja!

I don't like the source of their methane my trees and houses. And I feel methane is a poor source of energy. I am looking into the production of energy from some fuel that eats it's consumer. I think that will keep us at home and with birth control a viable planet.

Aw, golly, Sofer, you're a man after my heart!
It won't get the Nobel Peace Prize, though, .... maybe some other prize.

I just dropped by to see if you all were still talking about cucumbers because I couldn't imagine there would be that much to say about them. L.O.L.!

Well, now I have to say something about cucumbers.
The only insects to bother them are the various Cucumber beetles because they are the only insects immune to the poison in the leaves. This also makes the leaves and vines Deer and Rabbit resistant.
I grow slicers on the fence every year. Last year my old saved seed didn't sprout. I grow picklers for canning every few years - the jars of pickles last several years.
My mother always takes a thin sliver slice off the blossom end of every cucumber and tastes it - she says that is where it will be bitter if it is going to be bitter - and she wants to know before she serves it or cans it.

Good bit of folk knowledge there. I will try to remember that. Bitter cucumbers are yukky. I would certainly hate to contaminate my pickles with them.

i wish the rabbits in my garden last yr had read the same material you did about cucumber leave being poisonous. I might have actually got some cucumbers to survive....

So, there is more to say about cucumbers! We don't grow them but they are inexpensive at the farmer's market and D.H. makes sour pickles, bread and butter pickles, and dill pickles for me. He uses big and little ones depending.

Greenjay- they actually ate the vines? In my Mom's garden, the cucumbers were about the only thing the deer didn't eat. In my garden, the the rabbits didn't bother the cukes, but then they don't bother any of the warm season stuff - they go after the winter and spring stuff before the native grass and weeds green up.
I got my info from a book, I think it was "The Forgotten Pollinators".

Thanks you guys, you all gave me a good laugh this morning. and also learned about termites !!!!!!!!!. The only cukes that I grow are burpless Orient Express hyb. And for me they really are burpless, and I eat a lot of cucumbers, all summer. Cucumber sandwiches, cucumber salads, etc. I only had 3 vines last summer, climbing wire fence, and had lots of extras to take to Senior Center.

Donna

"Bigger transplants work best for slower growing things that transplant well - like tomatos - and not as well with fast growing vines. If you are already using big peat pots, you may already have gone as far as you can in that direction. Even with tomatos there is some transplant shock, and there is a sulking delay between the buds/blossoms/fruit they've already got and any new ones. Since I am trying to get the blossoms to beat the heat, not the fruit to beat the frost, that is a concern." Pollengarden...I've been a bit busy and I'm just now catching up on this thread. Your comment here on bigger tomato transplants has a familiar ring to it. Several years ago an Alaskan Uber in DG made a similar comment and thinking back several years, I transplanted some tomato plants in 4" peat pots which were about four feet tall. I would take them outside and place them on the east side of the house for several hours during the hardening off process. My former neighbor having grown up on a farm would laugh himself silly when he would see these all laying on the ground, blown over by the wind. Funny thing is these plants did just fine that year in the garden. I am giving thought to going back to starting a few tomato seeds next month in the peat pots, but potting them up to 2.5 gallon plastic pots for a month or so before transplanting around mid-April to covered cages. I alwas have backup plants in the event the early transplants don't do well, but I will be double caging this season and I am hopeful I can be harvesting in early July if this works. Early producing tomatoes have been my nemesis in the past, but it just makes me try harder to find a way to make it happen.

I am not sure what you mean by getting blossoms to beat the heat. Please explain.

m

mraider3: Blossoms won't set fruit if they aren't pollinated, and there is a temperature rage for pollination. It varies a bit depending on what the plant is, but most vegies won't set fruit if the temperatures are over 85-90F. We have a noticeable problem with tomatos here, and it effects other plants also. July is hot, we tend to get huge healthy-looking tomato plants with no tomatos on them. Then the temperatures drop down a bit, the huge plants set a huge crop all at once. Then when we get a killing fall frost, we loose unripe fruit. If the summer is especially hot, and the frost is especially early, we loose A LOT of green fruit.
My theory is to start things earlier in the spring rather than try to cover big plants later in the fall, and I'm going to try some of the shorter-season varieties like I used to grow in North Dakota, too. When I have set out larger transplants that already have a few buds/blossoms/fruit, the ones already on the plant go ahead a set/ripen - but I noticed it takes a while before they get any new ones, so smaller transplants can pass them up in the long run. So it is a trade-off.

As for setting out big tall lanky tomatos, they have the ability to root along the stem. You can decide how much of the top would make a nice stocky plant, and bury the rest (a 4' plant would be buried horizontally, not vertically) - an advantage tomotos have over most other transplants. For smaller vines like cucumbers, I plant them to grow up the fence. Larger vines like squash and pumpkins go in open ground - they will root down along the vine if the vine stays put. I put little sticks/stakes next to the vines to help stabilize them in the wind, moving the stakes outward as the vine grows/roots. Growing them in the stubble of another crop works, too.

pollengarden, points taken. I have had some tomato plants with nothing but blossoms in the late fall and no tomaotoes to speak of. For that very reason I am attempting to go to earlier starts. You suggestion about laying the four foot tall plants does make sense. I was also told by a DG memeber to do something similar when planting up from the 4" peat pots to larger plastic pots. Lay the root ball a bottom corner of the plastic pot and cover as much of the stem as possible with your potting mix. "The bigger the tomato root ball the better.", I believe was the quote.

Slightly off the subject of cucumbers here but I have another tomato tip from a neighbor who also gardens. He tells me an assocaite at the ag department where he works grows tomatoes in large pots, which makes sense since they can be moved inside out of the elements when neessary. However, it was his watering method which caught my attention. He waters heavily about once a week, watching the leaves carefully. When the leaves begin to shrivel from lack of water, he waters. His point is that the tomato plants using this method of watering will possibly out of defense, put energy into seed production, i.e., fruit production rather than vine production. I have never heard that before, but when you think about it, this might be a way to inspire fruit production in the later part of the summer rather than vines or more buds....What do you all think!!!

Tomatos don't take as much water as some other things in the vegetable garden, but Water stress doesn't sound like a good idea to me. He must keep a REALLY CLOSE eye on his tomatos & have super soil.
Alternating between too wet and too dry contributes to blossom end rot earlier in the season, and is the direct cause of cracking and splitting later in the season.
I know someone on the West Coast who swears by growing tomatos upside down in 5-gal buckets (top of tomato hangs out hole in bottom of bucket). I know someone here in Pueblo that tried it, and it made the cracking and splitting worse.
I don't always practice what I preach. I water my garden with soaker hoses. I tried burying them deeper, but then I couldn't tell how much I was watering. I always tell everyone to mulch, and last year I actually did it myself - the garden really did take less water less often. So my current recommendation is soaker hoses buried shallow and mulch.
I've seen pots and planters done on drip, I haven't tried that yet.