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Any gardener will know that when they are planning a garden, growing cucumbers should absolutely be part of the mix. They are great for beginner and veteran gardeners and are pretty easy to grow in general. From their prolific growth habit to the multitude of ways you can enjoy and preserve them, growing cucumbers should for sure have a place in your garden planning. Cucumbers belong to the Cucurbitaceae family (also known as gourds or cucurbits) along with winter squash and summer squash and have very similar growth habits and planting needs. Similarly to squash, there are hundreds of varieties of cucumbers to choose from.
Most cucumbers are similar to indeterminate tomatoes and grow in a vining habit and perform best when given a trellised structure to climb. Use a strong trellis that is well-supported with deeply driven stakes to support the fruits. Trellising will also keep the fruits cleaner and save time with harvesting and processing. Our Hortonova Trellis Netting works great for trellising cucumbers and is easy to install. While you may think that all cucumbers are basically the same, there are a lot of variations to choose from. Cucumbers come in lots of shapes, sizes, and flavors. Below are the common classifications of cucumbers for the home garden.
Like all other plants, pollination will always come into play if you want to be successful growing cucumbers. When choosing your variety, be sure and do research to see what type of cucumber you’re growing and how they are pollinated. Similarly to seedless watermelons, certain varieties, called gynoecious cucumbers, will include a different male pollinator variety in the HOSS seed packet to ensure proper pollination. All the seeds in a pack of gynoecious type cucumber need to be planted to ensure enough male pollinators are present.
Cucumbers grow best when direct-seeded outdoors and don’t transplant well because they don’t like having their roots disturbed. While some vegetables have specific dates and windows in which to plant (like potatoes), cucumbers have slightly more flexibility to get started in the ground, depending on your zone. Generally speaking, though, growing cucumbers should be started in early Spring but can be started as late as mid-summer. Cucumbers are not frost-tolerant at all so plant any time after the last Spring frost date, when the soil has warmed to at least 70°F.
When choosing a spot to grow cucumbers, full sun is always recommended. Remember when growing cucumbers that they love heat and moisture. Be careful not to over-plant cucumber plants because they can easily take over and become too difficult to manage and harvest.
Row Spacing – 3 feet
Plant Spacing – 8 to 12 inches
Planting Depth – 1 inch
Row Spacing – 2 feet
Plant Spacing – 8 to 12 inches
Planting Depth – 1 inch
HOSS always recommends getting a soil sample to your local extension office several weeks before planting. Once you get your results, you will need plenty of time to adjust your soil accordingly and make sure your plants are getting the best nutrients possible as soon as they hit the ground.
Click Here to find your local extension office.
Cucumbers are a crop that will require multiple harvests throughout the growing season. Regardless of variety, cucumbers will have better flavor and texture if they are harvested before they get too big. We recommend harvesting every 2-3 days so the fruits don't become too large and bitter.
Cucumber plants need at least 1″ of water every 5 days. Using drip irrigation is always recommended to be sure that your cucumber plants are getting moisture directly to their root system. If you’re using conventional overhead watering techniques, try and use something like the Dramm Watering Can and water and fertilize at the base of the plant to keep moisture off the leaves.
Several Weeks Before Planting
Test your soil at your local extension office.
1 Week Before Planting
After adjusting soil pH to 6.0 – 6.5, mix 1 1/2 cups per 10 ft. of row of Hoss Complete Organic Fertilizer with your soil.
2 Weeks After Planting
Sidedress 2 cups of Hoss Complete Organic Fertilizer per 10 ft. of row
Several Weeks Before Planting
Test your soil at your local extension office.
1 Week Before Planting
After adjusting soil pH to 6.0 – 6.5, mix 1 1/2 cups per 20 ft. of row of Hoss Complete Organic Fertilizer with your soil.
2 Weeks Before Planting
Using the Hoss Fertilizer Injector, Mix 1 cup of Hoss Premium 20-20-20 Fertilizer -AND -1-2 cups of Hoss Micro-Boost Micronutrient Supplement per 20 ft. of row.
Garden Insect Spray – Thrips, Pickleworms, leaf miners, Armyworms, mealy bugs
Horticultural Oil – Aphids, Squash bugs (Nymphs), Flea Beetle, Whiteflies, Spider Mites, Beetle larvae, leaf miners
Bug Buster-O – Aphids, Flea Beetle, Whiteflies, Cucumber beetles, Thrips, Mites, Armyworms
Monterey BT – Armyworms, pickleworms
Take Down Garden Spray – Aphids, Army Worms, Flea Beetle, Whiteflies, Mites, Squash bugs(Nymphs)Vine borer ( Nymphs)
Diatomaceous Earth – Cutworms
Non-Organic Controls
Bug buster ll – Aphids, , Squash Bugs, Flea Beetle, Whiteflies, Spider Mites, Thrips, leaf Miner, Vine borer, Cucumber beetle, Armyworms
Treat as needed using label instructions.
Non-Organic Controls
Liquid cop – Downy Mildew, Powdery Mildew, Anthracnose, Alternaria Leaf Spot
Garden Phos –, Downy Mildew, Powdery Mildew; Anthracnose, Alternaria Leaf Blight
Fungi Max – Powdery Mildew
Vegetable, Flower, Fruit and Ornamental Fungicide – Downy Mildew, Powdery Mildew; Anthracnose, Alternaria Leaf Blight, Cercospora Leaf Spot
Cucumbers can be harvested at just about any stage of growth. However, you don’t want to let your cucumber fruits get too large, as they will become bitter and the seeds will harden. Harvest often to signal the plant to keep producing more cucumbers through the season. Use pruning shears or a sharp knife to cut the stems and avoid damaging the vines. A good reference guide to harvesting based on the variety and the peak flavor is below:
Slicing Cucumbers – 6 to 8 inches
Pickling Cucumbers – 4 to 6 inches
Large Burpless Cucumbers – 10 inches or more depending on the variety
Growing cucumbers takes a certain level of planning because they are such heavy producers. Because cucumbers are made of 90% water, if you don’t plan on preserving your cucumber crop, wrap the fruits tightly in plastic wrap and store in the refrigerator for 7-10 days.
If you do decide to make pickles and enjoy your cucumbers all year, a great place to start is to visit the Food Preservation section of our website for everything you need to get started.
Our Bouquet Dill is a fast-growing and is perfect for making dill pickles. Many people say that it “grows like a weed”, which is appropriate since the proper term is dill weed. This variety goes to seed relatively quickly, making it easy to harvest the seeds for pickling.
If you see that your cucumbers plants aren’t producing as you’d hoped, try hand pollinating. Because only female flowers produce fruit on a cucumber plant, if your pollinators need some help, simply find the male flower and transfer the pollen to the center of the female flower. The male flowers are the ones that have a small protrusion sticking out of the middle of the bloom. They are also the first to bloom on the plant and there are a lot more of them typically than the female flowers.
While on an online gardening forum recently, I was reading an exchange between two people who were posting their personal wheel hoe review and commenting on the utility of the Wheel Hoe. One of them was criticizing the Wheel Hoe as an outdated piece of equipment that was “too much work,” while the other was
Step by Step on Growing Okra On this week’s episode, Travis is growing the easiest crops in the vegetable garden. Being apart of the Mallow family, okra is related to cotton or hibiscus and they all share similar flowers as well. It is pretty much a maintenance-free crop meaning it hardly needs any water or
Most of us have a limited amount of garden space. In order to maximize that space, it’s important that we grow as intensively as possible to get the most from our garden plots. There are several techniques that can be used to grow more intensively while allowing room for walkways and harvesting. The Wheel Hoe
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