We are getting close to the typical average last frost date at March 3rd. So now is the time to start some cucumber, squash or melon seeds indoors.
Starting Mix
First, you need some seed starting mix. You can use ready-made mixes, or you can make your own by using potting soil mix you have on hand. Since I always have some potting soil mix on hand for use in containers or up potting starts, I use that. I suggest screening it through a ¼ inch hardware cloth sieve to take out any larger pieces which might block the seeds from poking through the mix.
Once the soil is hydrated, add it to the seed trays. Since cucumber, squash, and melon seeds are larger seeds, they are planted at about twice their size or roughly ½ inch depth.
Next, place your starter tray on a rack or designated place, covering it with a humidity dome. If you have plant-start heating mats, they can be very helpful by warming the soil, but are not absolutely necessary. It is customary to “bottom” water seeds, so add water to the tray your seeds are in. The soil should be moist enough from the initial wetting process described above, thus only a little water should be needed in the tray. Add water only when soil dries out slightly. After about 15 minutes, if any water remains in the tray, drain it. The humidity dome should stay on until the seedlings begin to show.
Seedlings
The Armenian cucumber seeds in these photos germinated over five days from February 17th through the 22nd with the humidity dome being removed on February 22nd.
At this point the seedlings should be placed under grow lights slightly above their height. Adjust the height of the light as the seedlings grow. If the grow lights are too high, the seedlings will likely become “leggy,” because they are stretching to reach more light. This will cause them to be weaker due to the main stem being too long and thin, and likely top heavy. The first set of leaves on the seedlings are the cotyledon leaves. The next set of leaves you will see are the first true leaves and the cotyledon leaves will likely drop off.
Preparing Plants for the Garden
Hardening off is the process of acclimating the new seedling to the outdoors. This starts by moving them outdoors the first day for perhaps 2 hours. This continues daily, increasing amount of time of outdoor exposure each day for about 1 week. By then your new starts should be able to handle being transplanted into your outdoor garden.
If you prefer not to jump start your growing season by starting seeds indoors, cucumbers, squash, and melon seeds can be started in the ground in late March. Just be sure to check the long-range weather forecast to see if any possible freezing temperatures might happen.
Tim Long has been a UC Master Gardener in Stanislaus County since 2020. All photos are by the author.
/h3>/h3>/h3>- Author: Terry Pellegrini
But wait! Did you know that cucumbers are actually fruits? Botanically speaking a fruit should have at least one seed and grow from the flower of the plant. Because of this definition cucumbers are classified as fruits because they contain tiny seeds in the middle and grow from the flower of the cucumber plant. While I will always consider it a veggie - as I do that other “fruit” the tomato – knowing its proper classification makes my inner Master Gardener very happy.
Growing cucumbers is relatively easy, although they do take some care. They need plenty of sunshine, loose and nutrient dense, slightly acid soil. Adding several inches of compost or aged manure into the soil, worked in to a depth of about 6 inches, is usually all it takes to make them happy. They do not like frost so plant your seeds after the threat of frost has passed – about March 20th here in the Central Valley. If you are planting a vining variety place your trellis first, before planting your seeds or transplants to avoid disturbing the roots of the plants later on. Also cucumbers HATE being watered by sprinklers (trust me, I learned this one the hard way). Water only at the base of the plant - I use a drip system that the cucumbers seem to love.
Bush varieties need a little extra care as the immature cucumbers can die or get slimy if they sit on wet soil or in water all day. A good layer of mulch around the base of the plant and then under the maturing leaves will keep your cukes out of harm's way.
Harvesting your cucumbers will vary in timing and size depending on the variety, but on average it takes between 55 and 70 days. Your seed packets or the information that accompanies your transplants should tell you when to pick your cucumbers. But no matter the variety, always clip off your cucumbers, don't pull off or twist them. This can damage your plants and may discourage it from producing more flowers and thereby less cucumbers. With care, your plants should give you several harvests, especially if your succession plant your cucumbers – planting one to two weeks apart.
Once harvested, the fun begins. Your cucumbers can be added salads, made into sandwiches, and can be eaten straight from the vine (yes, you can eat the skin – be certain to wash it first). I love to make fresh tzatziki sauce for dipping and of, course, pickles! Fermented or refrigerated, dill or sweet, a pickle made from those from your own garden are extra special.
We are excited to announce the UCCE Stanislaus County Master Gardener Program has started a YouTube Channel! Our goal is to bring you FREE gardening programming asked for by members of the community.
Our first video, Spring Container Vegetable Gardening was just posted. It was recorded on April 15, 2020. Master Gardener Rho Yare tells you everything you need to know about growing food in containers in spring.
Although spring is in full swing, there's still time to purchase vegetable transplants from a local garden or nursery. You can find tomato, pepper, eggplant, cucumber, and squash plants. There's still time to get seeds in the ground for melons, pumpkins, and beans.
Upcoming Classes
We are planning for classes on vermicomposting (composting using worms), pollinators, fall container vegetable gardens, and possibly herbs. If you have a request, feel free to type it into the bottom of this article.
Online Classes
Transforming our classes from in-person to online has been a new challenge for us, but we are taking it in stride. Please let us know what you think about our classes by commenting or sending us an email at ucmgstanislaus@ucanr.edu
Watch our new video clicking on the link below. After watching the video, please share it with your gardening friends, and leave a comment telling us if you found it helpful.
- Author: Lauria Watts
Pickling season is here. If you don't have any in a garden you can harvest, check at your local grocery or Farmers' Market for pickling cucumbers and pickle away. Pickles are pretty easy to do, but the fresh refrigerator pickles, well you could have your children make them with a little supervising.
--Oh, what are pickling cucumbers? They are cucumbers especially suited to making pickles as their skins are especially tender. Grow them or buy them as they will give you the best results for your pickling efforts. Salad cukes are very much darker than pickling cukes. As you can see on below, picklers are lighter in color, can have more yellowish areas and are quite warty and bumpy.
If you find or grow pickling cucumbers select those that are evenly sized and still have lengthwise ridges; they will look almost shriveled, but actually feel very firm. Avoid the large ones that look yellowish and bulbous as these will soft pickles. Make sure they are hefty for their weight and when you squeeze them gently, they should not feel hollow. For sure, try them in a summer salad, or as sticks for a dip.
Remember also that there are a lot of ways to use pickles, and leftover pickle brine. Put pickles in egg salad, sandwiches (of course), burgers (not a sandwich, it's a BURGER!), or into tater salad--it's almost time to start really grilling. Mix chopped pickles with a bit of chopped onion, a squeeze of lemon or lime juice, salt, pepper, maybe a big pinch of dried dillweed (that you dried yourself!), a little granulated garlic and mayo--what do you have: a great tartar sauce for using on grilled fish. And use that leftover tartar sauce as a dressing for some fresh cucumbers and tomatoes, it's dang good. There is always the pickle pop: put a cold pickle on a popsicle stick and much away! And you could put some other things on that stick, like tomatoes and cheese, maybe some ham, and call it an appetizer. . .
Of course you could try a peanut butter and pickle sandwich. I won't, but if you do, could you let me know what you though of it?
These refrigerator pickles are tasty and quick, not too much fuss, and you store 'em in the fridge and chow down! This recipe is great for beginner picklers.
Refrigerator Kosher Dill Pickle Spears
Recipe adapted from: Christian, K. and Barefoot, S. (2015rev). Put It Up! Food Preservation for Youth. Athens, Georgia: National Center for Home Food Preservation. Retrieved from nchfp.uga.edu.
makes about 4 pint jars
3½ pounds of about 4-inch long pickling cucumbers (about 14)
2 cups water
1 cup distilled or cider vinegar (5% acidity)
¼ cup Ball® Kosher Dill Pickle Mix*
Sterilize empty jars by filling them with water and putting them right side up on the rack in a boiling water canner. Fill the canner with hot (not boiling) water to 1 inch above the tops of the jars. Boil 10 minutes at altitudes of less than 1,000 ft. At higher elevations, boil 1 additional minute for each additional 1,000 ft. elevation. Leave jars in the canner until use. Allow cooling to near room temperature.
Rinse cucumbers in a colander immediately before using. Scrub well, giving special attention to the area around the stems. Remove a 1/8 inch slice off each end of the cucumbers with a knife.
Slice cucumbers lengthwise in half, then in half lengthwise again until you have created spears. Place spears in a large bowl.
Measure and add water, vinegar and Ball® Kosher Dill Pickle Mix into a medium saucepan. Stir briefly and then turn burner to high heat to bring to a boil. Turn off heat, then pour/ladle hot pickling liquid carefully over cucumber spears in the large bowl. Let sit until the liquid cools to room temperature (about 30 minutes).
Using a jar lifter, remove jars from canner, empty them, and place them on a flat surface that is insulated from the cold counter with a couple of clean dishtowels or larger towel. With clean/gloved hands, pack cucumber spears to fit tightly without mashing into the jars; this will help to keep your pickle spears from floating. Trim spears if needed to make sure 1/2-inch at the top of the jar is left empty—you should probably trim them just a little shorter than this to insure they will be covered by brine but still have the correct1/2 inch headspace.
Ladle pickling liquid into jars leaving ½-inch headspace (from the top of the liquid to the top of the jar rim). Use bubble wand/freer or non metallic spatula to release any air bubbles that are trapped in each jar. Measure headspace with headspace tool to ensure it is ½-inch. Add or remove liquid with a spoon if needed to maintain ½-inch headspace, and make sure all spears are completely covered by liquid.
Wipe jar rims with clean, damp paper towel. Apply lids and ring bands, turning bands securely onto jars, but do not “wrench” them on.
Mark jars with date an place them in the refrigerator. You can eat within just a few days, but for best flavor, refrigerate for 3 weeks before eating, then share with family and friends! Be sure to keep them refrigerated and eat them all up within 3 months!
And then here's a boiling-water-processed larger batch for your off-the-shelf convenience:
Quick Fresh-Pack Dill Pickles
- 8 lbs of 3- to 5-inch pickling cucumbers
- 2 gals water
- 1¼ cups canning or pickling salt
- 1½ qts vinegar (5 percent)
- ¼ cup sugar
- 2 quarts water
- 2 tbsp whole mixed pickling spice
- about 3 tbsp whole mustard seed (2 tsp to 1 tsp per pint jar)
- about 14 heads of fresh dill (1½ heads per pint jar)
or
4½ tbsp dill seed (1½ tsp per pint jar)
Yield: 7 to 9 pints
Please read Using Boiling Water Canners before beginning. If this is your first time canning, it is recommended that you read Principles of Home Canning.
Procedure: Wash cucumbers. Cut 1/16-inch slice off blossom end and discard, but leave ¼-inch of stem attached. Dissolve ¾ cup salt in 2 gals water. Pour over cucumbers and let stand 12 hours. Drain. Combine vinegar, ½ cup salt, sugar and 2 quarts water. Add mixed pickling spices tied in a clean white cloth. Heat to boiling. Fill jars with cucumbers. Add 1 tsp mustard seed and 1½ heads fresh dill per pint. Cover with boiling pickling solution, leaving ½-inch headspace. Adjust lids and process according to the recommendations in Table 1 or use the low- temperature pasteurization treatment. For more information see "Low-Temperature Pasteurization Treatment" .
This document was adapted from the "Complete Guide to Home Canning," Agriculture Information Bulletin No. 539, USDA, revised 2015.
Reviewed February 2018.
http://nchfp.uga.edu/how/can6b_pickle.html Pickling at the NCHFP
http://nchfp.uga.edu/questions/FAQ_pickle.html Pickling FAQ
/table>
- Author: Steven T. Koike
The cucumber crop in central coast California is a minor crop, with only a modest acreage planted annually. However, a major disease threatens this commodity that is grown both out in the field and inside greenhouses. In recent years, a very aggressive, destructive strain of downy mildew (the pathogen is Pseudoperonospora cubensis) has devastated cucumber plantings. Leaves first develop angular shaped lesions that turn yellow. Later, the tissue in these lesions dies and becomes brown (photo 1). In most cases the diagnostic purple gray mycelium and spores develop on the leaf undersides (photo 2). As disease progresses, entire leaves decline and the plants collapse due to severe infection. Downy mildew also infects squash and watermelon, though this current problem is most problematic on cucumber.
California growers are hardly alone in this situation. Last year the aggressive downy mildew damaged cucumber crops in various parts of the USA, along the eastern seaboard stretching from New York down to Florida, and from there extending west as far as Wisconsin, Illinois, Missouri, Louisiana, and Texas. For California, downy mildew was reported on production cucumber in the central coast and other regions, and on seed cucumber crops in the upper San Joaquin Valley.
Management of this apparently new cucumber strain is difficult. Organic producers have few options because protectant sprays do not appear to help, and suitable resistant cultivars have not yet been identified. For conventional growers, early preventative sprays should be made (see the UC IPM website: http://www.ipm.ucdavis.edu/PMG/r116101611.html). This cucumber situation is yet another case illustrating how this group of pathogens is able to change and cause problems for growers. Central coast growers are already very familiar with the new races and aggressive outbreaks of lettuce and spinach downy mildews.
Plant Pathologist Steven Koike is monitoring the California cucumber situation and is collaborating with researchers in Michigan and North Carolina. He is interested in hearing about downy mildew outbreaks on cucumber in California (phone 831-759-7350; stkoike@ucdavis.edu).
Photo 1: Angular lesions on cucumber caused by downy mildew.
Photo 2: Downy mildew lesions support the purple growth of the pathogen.