Grow log by lynnee · Original thread
What you can learnA strong cucumber diary showing mature-plant relocation, trellising, recovery after root handling, heavy feeding, and repeated snack-size harvests.
*The days were calculated automatically and approximately.
The cucumber vine has produced five cukes since it was relocated to the Bounty. Two of them are oversized cukes that it was hiding under its leaves down behind the grow deck at the back of the Bounty. You've really got to watch these cukes carefully to find the cukes that they are currently developing!
YAY!!!
So far the vine isn't working on developing new cukes, but the growing tip is a couple of inches longer.
Looking at your photos makes me want to start some cukes! The heat got to my cukes outside just as they started flowering! I was so disappointed. Hoping to try again in a couple weeks with the outdoor cukes.
Wow, lynnee, you're not afraid to do major surgery on a cucumber plant! Hope that works out for you.
No, I'm not! Plants have this incredible will to live! As long as you don't break the stems, leave them some good leaves, and keep the roots fairly intact, they will usually recover from anything reasonable that you do.I nearly killed a nice green pepper plant by trimming the roots, but even it recovered and produced lovely green peppers afterwards.The leaves on the cuke are drooping a little now, but the garden room is unusually warm. It's 85 degrees outside, and the window gets sun all afternoon. The upside down leaves will right themselves overnight--I was amazed when a previous cuke did that. Tomorrow I have to move some of the Slicing Tomato teenagers to the now-vacant Farm 12XL. That will be a major test of the procedure, because there are six tomatoes in the current Farm 12XL.
lynnee Your cucumber plants look great! I have 2 AG cukes growing in my Bounty. It's my first time using hydroponic system + I have a brown/numb thumb so I'll be following this thread to get whatever help I can The cucumber plants are 30 days old now. I've been seeing white edges on the older leaves too and thought it might be edema from not getting enough light/ air flow. Good to know the white leaves don't affect the overall plant. The roots are doing really well - they even smell like cucumbers!
agnoob, Your cucumbers look great! The mottled and cracked lower leaves are also normal--don't take those off unless they start drying up completely.Some or all of the little cukes behind the blossoms may develop into mature cukes. You can tell which ones are no longer viable by looking at the stems. When the stems turn yellow at the point where they join the vine or the little cuke, the plant has decided to shut them down. You can remove these because they will never mature.
I noticed that there was an answer posted on the aerogarden seed pod kit Q&A for these cucumbers:4-6 cm is quite a lot smaller than I was expecting! Some of mine are already bigger than that. I wonder if that’s accurate or if they meant inches?.
Yay, gingercat, you have cukes! Given that cm are mentioned twice, they probably meant cm. That means they are what I would call "cocktail" cucumbers, if there is such a thing.4 cm = 1.57 in10 cm = 3.9 inWhy don't you try one of your larger cukes, and see how it tastes? If it's bitter, then that would verify the cm measurement.My Mini Munch cukes tasted fine when they reached a fat 6", even though they were supposed to be best at 3-4". I'm surprised that the AG cukes are even smaller than the Mini Munch!EDIT: There was one 3" cuke on my right-hand AG vine, so I ate it. It tasted great. I didn't see any smaller cukes, so now I'm wondering, too, whether the measurement should be inches rather than centimeters.
gingercat--I agree; the cm measurements sound really small. Can you post a pic of your cukes? Do they look filled out and mature? I haven't started an AG cuke yet; I'm still dealing with the Iznik but I love seeing y'all's results.
slw, the single 3" cuke that I found wasn't filled out (it was pear-shaped), and I didn't have any smaller developed cukes anywhere. It does look like the cm measurement is wrong.
I harvested and ate four of mine yesterday, ranging from 7/8 cm to about 11 cm. They were all delicious! The smaller ones were particularly sweet. The larger one was less sweet, but still tasty. These definitely are exceeding my expectations for taste and productivity. (I can't even count how many I have growing on my five plants--which all germinated from one seed pod!) The three in kratky jars are behind the ones growing in the Farm, but they are producing plenty of cucumbers as well. These look pretty well filled out to me, though I'm no expert on growing cucumbers.
Looking plump! I wouldn't hesitate to let them grow a little bit longer though.
Love your photos, gingercat! Your cukes look perfect to me, ready to harvest or to let grow another inch. I found two more 2.5" cukes on my vines and ate them. Delicious! These might be Mini Munches, but I don't think they taste quite the same. Mini Munch isn't the only variety of mini-cukes, so the AG cuke is probably one of those. Mini Munch is slightly better, slightly crisper.If we were to harvest these AG cukes at 1.57", we'd be eating buds! That AG message has to be wrong.Whenever my MiniMunch had a cucumber that had reached the size of a pickling cucumber (because it had successfully hidden the cuke behind its leaves), the cuke tasted fine. It just wasn't so sweet.
gingercat--how are you managing the vines in Kratky jars? I'd like to see that setup. What size jars/containers are you using? I have only done lettuce, cherry tomatoes, and now a banana pepper plant in a jar but never a vine. I used to like growing sweet potato vines in jars (before I'd ever heard of "Kratky") just for the plant, but those never had anything but leaves.
The question as to which variety the AG cukes are brings up a more general question I have: Aerogarden, in general, never seems to tell you what variety, hybrid, or source their seeds are. Does anybody know if aerogarden has their own breeding program to create their own hybrids with characteristics that thrive in their gardens? Do they contract growers to hybridize products? Do they just buy seeds like we do and hide the variety info. If you bought an AG pod of deer tongue lettuce, would it be the same as buying deer tongue lettuce seeds from some other source?
@fsullom, when I asked Aerogarden what tomato seeds they used, they responded with generalized instructions on choosing plant varieties that work--look for determinate dwarf varieties, etc. In short, "we ain't sayin!'"I think they just buy seeds like we do. If Deer Tongue lettuce has a lot of hybridized varieties, then it's anybody's guess which one AG uses. Also, I find that even plants grown from "heirloom" seeds can differ a little, depending on the seed company.
lynnee My two AG cucumber plants are starting to get pretty big with tons of roots in my Bounty. Should I only keep one cucumber in a Bounty? I just bought a new Bounty on sale so I can move one of pants to the new one.
agnoob, it might be a good idea to move one cucumber vine to your second Bounty. I have two vines in a Farm 12XL, but that reservoir is twice the size of a Bounty reservoir.