What's wrong with my lemon cuke plants??

Greetings!

I have two lemon cucumber plants that seem to be healthy to the point of producing, but definitely have something wrong with them. I'm not sure if it's a fungus, a virus, or a nutrient issue, but I would be grateful if anyone could offer some insight into the issue! I'm thinking it's probably a fungus. Treatment options would also be appreciated.

Here are some pics. Note that the blight (or whatever it is) is not effecting the entirety of the plants--just the portions of the plants closest to where the stem meets the ground. The outer runners of the plants still appear to be green and healthy.

And another picture:

Hi, Moonpye!

I am no expert by any means but I did buy a book at the recommendation of a Master Gardener and it has served me well.

I compared your pictures to the pictures in my book and it looks like either alternaria leaf spot or anthracnose. They are both caused by a fungus. The book that I have suggests chemicals for treatment (the book is by Ortho). I don't know if you are an organic gardener and are opposed to using chemicals.

I hope some fellow DGers can chime in here and perhaps recommend an organic solution? If you want to use the chemicals, ortho suggests for anthracnose to use Ortho Garden Disease Control. If it's alternaria use a fungicide that has chlorothalonil.

From what I can see from the picture, it looks more similar to the anthracnose. The picture that I have shows leaves with brown spots on them with holes in the middle of the brown spots.

I hope this helps some.

Thanks so much for your help, Noobie! I kind of suspected either of the two fungi you mentioned, and I am an entirely organic gardener, so I went out and bought some "Garden Safe" fungicide that, apparently, can treat anthracnose, alterneria, and a host of other fungi. I'm not sure if it's ENTIRELY in-keeping with completely organic gardening, but I know it's better than Ortho, and it claims it's for organic gardening...

At any rate, it also says it's toxic to bees, and my lemon cukes are COVERED in honeybees right now. Lord knows the honeybees don't need anymore adversaries in this world...it claims it's only toxic if it gets sprayed right on the bee, so I think I may try to paint it onto the leaves tonight, avoid the flowers, and hope for the best.

Thanks for your help, again!

-Moonpye

No worries, Moonpye! Glad I could help. Good luck!

I have the same thing on my cucumbers, sweet success.

I've been thinking it was anthracnose too, especially since we had so much rain early in the season. I will hope for the best this year, do a good fall cleanup and rotate crops next year, as I'm completely organic.

http://www.ppdl.org/dd/id/anthracnose-cucumber.html