In article ,
"Martin Riddle" wrote:
"Billy" wrote in message
...
In article ,
"Martin Riddle" wrote:
I have not ever planted cucumbers before so I'm not sure what to do.
I have a small cucumber plant ( covered by a soda bottle ) and it has
a
flower, it only has 4 leaves. Do I need to pinch off the early
buds?
Or let em run their course.
Zone 6
Thanks
First hot day and your covered cucumber is going to be toast, unless
it's inside, which is unlikely since you have flowers, unless you got
this from a nursery and they have had it under lights, unless . . .
Right, the question. You don't have to pinch the flower off, and I
probably wouldn't, but you may get a little more production out of it,
if you do, maybe.
I just get the feeling that there are some other questions that you
should be asking.
If you leave the flower on, you'll taste a fresh cucumber earlier. I
just hate delayed gratification.
--
- Billy
Thanks, I plan on removing the bottles this weekend. There's lots of
condensation in them, they only get maybe 4 hours of sun a day.
Will that improve?
It's been mild and wanted to try the bottles to keep the squirrels out.
Oh, I know his song. After chew the tops off of 4 African marigolds, and
dumping out some seedling, I wrapped the trunk of the oak tree that
comes down next to my pots with chicken wire. I've had a lot fewer
surprises lately. It was fun yesterday, watching a squirrel trying to
get into the bird feeder. He'd have two feet on a branch, and two hands
on the bird feeder, and the bird feeder would swing away from him, and
he's sear for awhile. then he got on top of the feeder, and then slid
off, just catching himself on the wind chime below. The chicadees,
robins, and jays are are really working it. I have to put a medium sized
coffee can of black sunflower seeds in it/day to keep them fed.
The kids keep digging in the mulch.
Really should just be sprinkled on, but if it doesn't hurt the roots and
entertains the kids, what the heck.
I'll switch to chicken wire.
I just did that for Mr. Pesky, our raccoon mascot here at Camp Runamuck.
He had been digging up the mulch, looking for worms, I suppose, so I put
down wire fencing on the ground so that he can't dig anymore. The he
started to take an interest in the pepper patch, and we lost 4 out of 31
peppers. Now the pepper patch looks like the DMZ.
But I think the cumbers liked the bottle, as well as the cantelope.
They both seem to be developing nicely in the warmer temps.
You may try putting down some clear plastic sheeting around you plants.
You can get it at the hardware store. I think they use it for painting.
I put it down for my peppers and tomatoes and then just cut an X in the
plastic where I wanted to plant (usually next to a drip emitter). In
replacing 2 of the peppers today, before the chicken wire went up, I was
very pleased with the sauna temps in the soil.
I'm running about 2 1/2 months ahead of where I was last year at this
time. It was mid August before any tomatoes or peppers set. This year,
even with all the inclement weather
http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article...CLES/100529553
I have half a dozen jalapeņos set plus 6 or 7 sets on the tomatoes. One
tomato (Stupice) had 3 tomatoes on it when it got planted, but it had
been outside for a month and a half so it counts.
Oh, and these are from seeds.
Must be doin' somethin' right to have flowers then ;O)
Cheers
I'll drink to that.
--
- Billy
"Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the
merger of state and corporate power." - Benito Mussolini.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Arn3lF5XSUg
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Zinn/HZinn_page.html