Choosing Healthy Cucumber and Squash Seedlings
In my cool Pacific Northwest climate, plants that belong in the cucurbit (squash) family, including melons, cucumbers, summer squash like ‘Costata Romanesco’ and ‘Trombocino’ and winter squash, grow best when planted out as seedlings. Seedlings grow faster and produce fruit sooner than plants directly seeded into the garden with one caveat: you must plant small seedlings. If you buy seedlings, do not be tempted by plants that are beginning to vine. It turns out bigger is not always better. These larger plants tend to transplant poorly, grow slowly and underperform.
I have much better luck with very small seedlings. When cucurbit seedlings germinate the first “leaves” that appear are the spoon shaped cotyledons (also called seed leaves). The plants “true leaves” (the leaves that look like the plants regular leaves) emerge next. The best time to plant squash family seedlings is when the first true leaf is beginning to poke up between the cotyledons. This goes for store bought and homegrown seedlings.
Cucurbits really resent having their roots disturbed. Instead of separating seedlings growing in a clump, I ease the plants out of their pot and plant the whole group of seedlings in the ground (or container). I then give the plants a week or so to grow before I cut off the weakest plants at the soil line with scissors, leaving the strongest one to grow on. I like to pour about a cup of diluted liquid organic fertilizer around the newly transplanted seedlings, and I also set a cloche over the plants for a couple of weeks to keep them toasty warm.
I’m getting a bit of a late start on my summer garden, but I’m planning on getting some squash, tomatoes, peppers, and eggplants into the ground this weekend! I’ll let you know what I end up planting. So far I haven’t been able to find seed or seedlings of my favorite cucumber ‘Satsuki Midori’, so I might have to try something new!
Talk about perfect timing! I was just about to search for info about when to put my cucumber seedlings in the ground (in the PNW) and this was in my feed.
May 31st, 2012 at 11:39 amI just discovered “digginfood” yesterday. What a wonderful wonderful website. My son-in-law assembled a greenhouse for me last fall and my “garden” is 12 half barrels (less stupeing to weed for a 77yr old) We have chickens, ducks, and geese. I freeze the duck and goose eggs for baking later in the year. A few weeks ago I put two eggs under a sitting duck and now have 2 peeps in a dog carrier until they are big enough to put in the field. You have every type of advise I could ask for..Thank you soooo much!! (I also have a gillion cookbooks)
June 1st, 2012 at 8:02 amThanks! I have a bunch of watermelon seedlings that I would have waited to plant out, but see that they are at the perfect stage now, this will save me the troubel of moving them to bigger pots.
June 2nd, 2012 at 8:21 pmI started most of my vegetable garden seedlings from seed this year and they seem to be doing great. I hope the weather changes here and warms up so I can get them transplanted to our vegetable garden.
My cucumbers and squash are starting to get fairly big for still being in their pots, although I did transplant them into bigger pots while waiting for the weather to change.
Hope they do well.
I’m not sure if I should start my seeds later or move to a climate where I can plant them sooner.
June 6th, 2012 at 4:21 amI am going to start my pumpkin and cucumber seeds later next year. This spring they had 4″ to 8″ leaves when I transplanted them. Until I read this column I couldn’t underestand why the leaves all dried up. They did come back and are doing well but would have been further ahead had I planted them sooner. Here is my story about pumpkin seeds: In 2010 I took the Holloween pumkins from the porch an set them in the flower garden until I had time to dispose of them.(never happened) Last spring the seeds sprouted and I trained a few of the vines in and around the flower plants. What a GREAT ground cover. I am doing the same this year. I’ll try to post a picture later this summer when everything is in bloom.
June 6th, 2012 at 8:17 amI’m glad to hear that you are able to do eggplants where you are because I’m trying them down in the SF bay area for the first time and was worried it might be too cold!
Thanks for the tip about squash haveing delicate roots. I’ll be thinning mine out soon and I will definitely be snipping them instead of pulling them now.
June 11th, 2012 at 11:55 pmHi!
June 21st, 2012 at 9:34 pmMy cucumber seedlings have sprouted and are on their way as long as the warm weather keeps up. I’m keeping my fingers crossed.
I loved the post; great info for picking out cucumber seedlings. I’ll definitely look into it next time I start my cucumber harvest.
I recently wrote a post about companion plants, which included some info about cucumbers and squash. If you get a chance to check it out, lemme know what you think:
http://www.uponfurtherinspection.com/6-companion-planting-powerhouses-for-your-urban-garden/
I really like the website setup. Keep up the good work. I’ll be dropping by every now and then.
February 1st, 2013 at 9:56 pm