The Walden Effect: Farming, simple living, permaculture, and invention.

Cucumber completion

cucumber completion

Why do some cucumbers look more complete than others?

Pollination.

On cloudy days less pollinators out flying equal a pollination rate under 100%.



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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.



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I harvested some cucumbers today. They just look like yours... it's so funny to see some of your cucumbers as strange as mine.

I guess they don't look so complete because they're less exposed to the sun. Because all of the strange ones were harvested in shaded areas, or too close to the ground. I don't know if this is your case as well?

Another possible cause is the lack of water in the last few days. On the day before yesterday, it was sunny and very hot, but I decided not to water my cucumbers in order to prevent them from growing too much. In the afternoon, their leaves looked a little dehydrated, but they recovered through the night. Two days later, I found these strange-shaped cucumbers in shaded areas.

Comment by Mary Wed Jul 9 11:01:31 2014
Sorry I just found some information, and now I believe that the real cause is pollination. Please remove my last comment, as well as this one :-)
Comment by Mary Wed Jul 9 11:10:42 2014
Mary --- I could delete your comments, but I like your observational skills. And it's very true that improper pollination isn't the only thing that can cause this problem. In fact, hot, dry weather can too since those conditions can kill pollen (giving the same results as improper pollination) or can stress the plants enough to make the fruits curl. Finally, too much nitrogen can cause similar results. So it really might have been your hot, dry spell.
Comment by anna Wed Jul 9 17:53:23 2014





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