Growing Cucumbers - How to Grow Cucumbers Outside from Seed

Growing cucumbers is not difficult and can be grown successfully if you have the right growing conditions. Learn how to grow cucumbers and what is needed to grow them successfully. They have been grown for thousands of years and are an important salad vegetable.

Growing Cucumbers on Frames or in Ridges

Cucumbers can be divided into 2 distinct groups; the frame or English cucumbers or those grown outside called ridge cucumbers.

Frame cucumbers are so called because they are trained to climb up framework and to grow straight fruit. Ridge cucumbers are cultivars that are grown in ridges or hills or though there is no real reason why they cannot be grown on the flat. These are grown without support and allowed to ramble.

Growing Cucumbers in The Right Soil Conditions

Growing cucumbers in dry or very wet soils should be avoided. Cucumbers succeed best in warm, moist, rich, loamy ground with the ideal pH level at 5.5 - 7.0. The ideal conditions for cucumbers to grow in require heat, and a fair proportion of moisture. They should not be planted or set in the open air until the cold weather has past and there is a good prospect of warm weather. If cucumbers are planted early, not only are the seeds liable to decay in the ground, but the young plants are frequently cut off by frost.

How to grow cucumbers outside is to plant cucumber seeds in hills or ridges. The hills should be 3 feet apart in each direction. Make them fifteen or eighteen inches in diameter, and a foot in depth; fill them three-fourths full of thoroughly rotted compost, and then place four or five inches of earth over the whole, raising the hill a little above the level of the ground; plant 6 -8 seeds in each, cover half an inch deep, and press the earth smoothly over with the back of the hoe. When all danger from bugs and worms is past, thin out the plants; leaving but three or four of the strongest or healthiest to a hill.

Growing Cucumbers by Seed

Cucumbers are usually grown by seed rather then seedlings, however, you can raise seedlings in small trays in a protected area and then plant them out when all signs of frost have gone.

Growing Cucumbers by Looking after your Plants

As soon as your cucumbers start to flower give them an application of liquid manure. Make sure that you do this by applying the manure under the foliage in the root area after a thorough watering.

Growing Cucumbers and Knowing When to Harvest and Pick

As soon as the cucumbers reach a suitable size, usually after 8-10 weeks, they should be picked, whether required for use or not. The imperfectly formed, as well as the symmetrical, should all be removed. Fruit, however inferior, left to ripen on the vines, soon destroys their productiveness. The fruit should be removed with a sharp knife or a pair of secateurs about twice a week.

Growing Cucumbers and Identifying Diseases and Pests

When you learning how to grow cucumbers you should also be aware of the types of pests and diseases that attack this vegetable. The most common are aphids, red spider mites, beetles and fruit flies. Cucumbers are also susceptible to powdery and downy mildew. Mildew on plants is a fungal disease that often occurs with humid weather and watering plants in the evening where the moisture is retained by the leaves. It is better to water in the mornings, allowing the sun to dry the leaves off, minimizing the chance of mildew from attacking your plants. See our section on organic pesticides to get rid of these pests from your vegetables.

If you notice white patches on your cucumbers that are oval in shape and found on the upper-side of your fruit this is sun scorch. It normally happens towards midsummer when the sun is beating down and the foliage is starting to deteriorate and not being able to protect the plants. The only remedy is to make regular pickings.

Growing Cucumbers and Saving the Seeds

It makes sense to save seeds of good vegetable varieties. When a few seeds are needed for the vegetable garden, two or three of the finest-formed cucumbers should be selected early in the season, and allowed to ripen on the plants. In September, or when fully ripe, cut them open, take out the seeds, and allow them to stand a day or two, or until the pulp attached to them begins to separate; when they should be washed clean, thoroughly dried, and packed away for future use.

Growing Pickling Cucumbers

The land for raising cucumbers for pickling must be in good condition, and not easily affected by drought. It should be deeply ploughed, and the surface afterwards made fine and friable by being thoroughly harrowed. The hills should be 3 feet apart, and are generally formed by furrowing the land at this distance in each direction. Manure the hills with well-rotted compost, level off, draw over a little fine earth, and the land is ready for planting.

This may be done at any time from the middle of June to the first week in July. The quantity of seed allowed to an acre varies from three-fourths of a pound, upwards. In most cases, growers seed very liberally, to provide against being eaten by worms and bugs; usually putting six or eight times as many seeds in a hill as will be really required for the crop. When the plants are well established and beyond danger, the field is examined, and the hills thinned to three or four plants; or, as many plants required.

As fast as the cucumbers reach the proper size, they should be picked; the usual practice being to go over the crop daily. In gathering, all the fruit should be removed,—the misshapen and unmarketable, as well as those which are well formed; as when any of the crop is allowed to remain and ripen, the plants become much less productive.

RECOMMENDED SEEDS AND BOOKS ON GROWING CUCUMBERS
AND OTHER VEGETABLES

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