There are several reasons why a cucumber will curl (called crooking), including pollination troubles (such as not enough pollinators, or hot weather damaging the pollen) or not enough nutrients, water, light, or adequate warmth. Pests and diseases can also cause curling or deformed cucumbers. If the fruit is blocked by an obstacle while it is developing, even a leaf, then it can curl; growing cucumbers on a trellis, so that the fruit can hang, helps to prevent this problem. Check to see if your plants are receiving ideal conditions, and look for any signs of pests and diseases. In hot weather, you might provide some shade during the hottest part of the day.  Also, if you are growing cucumbers outdoors, be sure that the variety you select is not parthenocarpic (for example, ‘Sweet Success’); these cucumber varieties do not need pollination and are best grown in the greenhouse, where there are no pollinators; if they do become pollinated, then the fruit can curl or become otherwise misshapen.

If round cucumbers are occurring on just one plant but others are normal, then your seeds are to blame. Occasionally, a hybrid seed will make it into a packet and produce unexpected results, which is probably what happened in your case. Don’t worry, though, as spherical cucumbers are essentially the same as normal ones—just a little more well-rounded!

Yes, cucumbers appreciate the warm summer temperatures and should mature in approximately six weeks under good conditions.

It is possible that the plants may grow back, if the roots are intact, especially if the plant is pampered (grown at optimum conditions and protected from extreme temperatures). But it might be safer to start again from seed, or buy transplants. Damaged plants likely will take a while to recover (if they do), delaying harvest, and they may not be as vigorous. You could keep a few, to see if they perk back up, but add new ones, too, as a precaution. Protect against animal and insect pests, such as covering seedlings with a row cover.

Damping off, a fungal disease, is a problem with young cucumber seedlings. Make sure your pots and soil are sterile and plant just a few seeds in a cup. Use room temperature water and keep the soil just moist. Watering from the bottom sometimes helps. Air circulation is also important. Keep a small fan nearby if needed. Thin seedlings if they seem to be crowded in the cup or pot. Good luck!

Hi, Ela: Thanks for this fantastic question! One thing that may be happening concerns the fact that English cucumbers are self-fruiting, not in the sense that they pollinate themselves (as self-fruiting often means), but that they don’t need pollination. For this reason, they produce only female flowers. If a bee or the wind or whatever comes along and pollinates that flower, then the resulting fruit will usually be misshapen in some way. So if your cukes are not only not straight, but also bulging or curving, etc., then you may have to take steps to prevent the flowers from being pollinated. However, if your cukes continue to be of uniform diameter as they curve, then the solution may be somewhat more straightforward: gravity. Just grow them from a trellis so that they hang down, and gravity will hopefully keep pulling them down on the straight and narrow–or at least more than they appear to be now. Thanks again, and good luck!

You can find out the recommended times to plant and harvest in your area, based on local climate, by going to this page and putting in your zip code.

http://www.almanac.com/gardening/planting-dates/

For San Diego, for example, sowing cucumber seeds outdoors can be done in October, for a harvest in mid-November through December. Seeds can be sown indoors the month of January, as well as sown outdoors the first half of February, for a harvest from mid-April through mid-May.

Botanically speaking, cucumbers are a fruit, developing from the flower and containing seeds. But as far as seed catalogs and salads, they are treated as a vegetable, in part because they have a more savory than sweet taste.

Cucumbers can turn yellow if they are overripe, diseased (such as by a virus), over-watered, or have nutrient deficiencies. (There are also yellow varieties, but it sounds like yours isn’t one of those.) Follow the harvesting recommendations for your particular variety – pickling cucumbers can be picked for gherkins around 1.5 to 2 inches long, or for dills from 3 to 6 inches long, depending on type. Check the health of the vine and leaves – any sign of disease or stress? If you suspect that your soil is low in nutrients, you might want to have it tested. You might also remove the yellow cucumbers to encourage more fruit set; it could be that the future cucumbers will be green and healthy.

If you suspect that an animal is getting to your cucumbers - mouse, vole, chipmunk, squirrel, raccoon - then you might try protecting the cucumber plants with wire mesh. It would help to know exactly what pest it is, as some can dig under barricades, or hop/climb over to a certain height. But for starters, for small animals – you might try a 2-foot-tall or more barrier around the plant, buried 6 to 10 inches deep. For more information, try our animal pest pages, such as:

http://www.almanac.com/blog/gardening-blog/be-critter-detective
http://www.almanac.com/pest/voles
http://www.almanac.com/pest/mice
http://www.almanac.com/pest/rabbits
http://www.almanac.com/pest/raccoons
http://www.almanac.com/pest/squirrels

Cucumbers need a gallon of water a week. Here is a handy chart to guide you with any other vegetables you might grow: http://www.almanac.com/content/when-water-vegetables

Hmph. Had a similar problem with zucchini. Lots of seeds were set out, but only one germinated. So I planted more seeds and bought a few seedlings. Now half a dozen more seeds are coming along. That doesn’t help you, of course, but the trigger seemed to be the heat.

That doesn’t explain the two out of four rows of green and yellow haricot vert beans that failed me. All beans were from the same packets. The rows are only a foot or two away. Why would some pop up fine and others never show? When I asked an expert she just shrugged and said, “You never know.” Another year, “new” carrot seeds just disappeared in the soil never to send up even a sign.

Maybe the seeds were too deep. Maybe they got too dry. Maybe there wasn’t enough heat to keep them going. (I know, you said all those conditions were in favor. I thought so too.)

You can start the seeds indoors and then transplant seedlings. (Stores sell almost everything as seedlings these days. It must be working…) But that would give you an early idea of what to expect.

Look at it this way: If you put in more seeds now, you can thin the weaklings. Or transplant them. It would be unfortunate to think a month from now, “what if…” or “I shoulda…”

We understand your dilemma (and frustration). Give them another day or so, then reseed.

We’ve heard old timers soak cucumbers in salted water for several hours or overnight. Another tip suggests cutting off the end of the cucumber and rubbing it against the cut end and then doing it again on the other end. Good luck!

The sooner you thin your cucumbers the better. You may not be able to save the tiny plant that you pull up. You can try to plant them in small pots with potting mix to see if they will survive.

Hi, Steven, The first question is, are you getting flowers? Cukes have male and female flowers; the latter have a small fruit behind them. The male flowers, which form before the female flowers, produce the pollen needed to produce the fruit (cukes), but that's all they do in the process. If you have been getting both flowers and no fruit, you might lack pollinators. Hand pollication is an option in that case.
There is a slight difference in the timing of the appearance of the male and female flowers, often a function of plant variety and/or environmental conditions.
The proximilty of the squash should not be a concern; these plants belong to the same family.
We hope this helps!
 

The fuzz should disappear when the cuke matures. Is it possible that your cuke cross-pollinated with something else in your garden?

You can prune the lateral shoots, but do keep the main stem. You may want to do this several times during the growing season. The first flowers to bloom are the male flowers. You will recognize the female flowers by a small bump at the bottom of the flower. Make sure that you have enough pollinators around.

You may have a pollination issue. Either you don't have enough pollinating insects right now or it's a timing thing with too many male flowers opening. The male flower has to pollinate the female flower (which are the ones with the swelling beneath the flower). You can try to hand pollinate by moving pollen from a male flower to the female blooms.

Hi Jason,
You are lucky to have such a  nice garden this early in the season. With the warm climate in Texas you don't need to worry about late cold spells hurting the plants. Just keep the plants watered and they should do fine. You may want to plant some more beans so that when you harvest the beans that are blooming now you'll have a second harvest coming.

Hi, Jamie,
Cukes love heat. One thing you write is concerning: daily watering. You might be drowning your plants. The surface soil might appear dry, but if you are watering daily, the soil at the root might be soaked. Another question that has to be asked: does you raised bed have good drainage? Too much water and bad drainage are a recipe for failure.
That said, powdery mildew is a common disease of cucurbit crops in Florida. Neem is recommended for powdery mildew, but use with caution. One resource suggests that it could be harmful to beneficial insects. Others also recommend removing infected leaves and allowing the plants to dry out.
In future, something to think about: try to grow disease-resistant plants.

Transplant cucumbers 3 to 4 weeks after sowing indoors. They should be young and healthy plants, with 1 or 2 true leaves (not including the first set of leaves, called the cotyledons). Plant out only after last expected spring frost, and be sure to harden them off for about a week so that they get used to being outdoors. Cucumbers don't like their roots disturbed, so handle them very gently.
If your cucumbers are growing past the 2 true leaves and it isn't time yet to plant them out, keep them indoors until it is past frost--they are very susceptible to cold. Or, you might try employing season extension techniques, such as warming the soil with black plastic mulch, and then planting the hardened-off cucumbers there, with a plastic tunnel overhead to keep them in a warm atmosphere. Make sure they do not get near freezing--or too hot.

Based on your description, there are two diseases which come to mind. 1) Gummy stem blight. Symptoms include sappy substance in any open wounds, wilted vines, and fruit with rotted rind. These plants would need to be destroyed; preventative fungicides could be used on the remaining plants. The problem is often caused by the seed source. Avoid watering the leaves; water at soil level. 2) Blossom-end rot:  Symptoms are darkened rot on the end of the fruit where the flower was. The problem is caused by a lack of calcium in the soil which is often revealed with inconsistent watering and/or over-fertilization. We'd suggest you bring a sample to your local cooperative extension office for a diagnosis!

Hooked cucumbers aren't uncommon and it's related to irrigation. Cucumbers need very consistent, regular water supply as well as ample moisture (about 1 to 2 inches of water per week), especially during the early blossoming and fruit development stages.

Yes, you can train vining cucumbers to a trellis. Normally, you want to set up the trellis before planting but you can try to train the vines that are still growing.

Yes, slicing cucumbers are best for eating fresh, but they can also be used in canning. We've tried bread and butter pickles and they tasted great.

Congrats on growing cucumbers successfully! Sure, you can harvest regular cucumbers at any size that you think you can use them. Keep in mind: cucumbers do grow very quickly--check every day once they get going!
You certainly don't want the cucumbers to get too big or they get bitter. They're too big if the end is getting yellow. Also, it helps to harvest them regularly to get more yield.

You'll want to store cucumbers in a cool spot in in the kitchen in perforated plastic bags. Storage in refrigerator for a few days is okay but cucumbers will get water-soaked areas if chilled below 40°F. For best taste, eat them as quickly as you're able. Do not store with apples or tomatoes.

Cucumbers do not like to be transplanted or moved.  If you must transplant, you need to do it very early before the plant has true leaves and keep the entire root ball intact. Otherwise, they won't make it.

If you can keep the groundhog away, the vine may still produce leaves (put not in the same places) and cukes. Relocating the animal by trapping and moving or driving it out of its den (hopefully not to a new one in the middle of your garden) is the preferred solution. Physical deterrence with a fence (buried) and/or screening (chicken wire over the top) sometimes works. Putting a human-smelling (hair, clothes) border around sometimes works, too, as does using other substances they might dislike. Sometimes. Good luck!

Hi Judy,
It may work if you use a sturdy okra variety like Cowhorn. The only problem is that okra leaves are big and may shade the cucumber plants too much. It's worth a try and please let us know if it worked.

Hi Randy,
It's important to harden off seedlings that have been started indoors. You can try direct seeding in the garden to see if that works. Or, start a new batch indoors and make sure to gradually move the seedlings outdoors.

It sounds like your cucumbers are getting too much water. You should not water cucumber plants from overhead, it is better to soak the ground around the bottoms of the plants.

Hi Dinah,
We suggest that when seedlings are about 4 inches tall to thin them so that  they are 1½ feet apart. If the plants are healthy you should see flowers soon.

Plant seed after the danger of frost has passed and the soil has warmed. In zone 8, you can often plant in early April but check your frost dates. The soil should be 70 °F and no lower than 50 °F for seeds to germinate. You could get a cheap soil thermometer to check the temps of your soil.

The length of the growing season will depend on your local climate. You can find the number of days in the growing season of several large cities, plust the expected frost dates, at this page:
 
http://www.almanac.com/content...
 
For further information by state, see:
 
http://cdo.ncdc.noaa.gov/cgi-b...
 
Or, you might try contacting your county's Cooperative Extension, as they should have the best data for your local area. For contact information, see:
 
http://www.almanac.com/content...

Cucumbers like warmth. When the weather gets cooler, they may deteriorate until frost hits and stops them completely. They may also die off due to other cultural stresses such as too hot/too much direct sun, too much water, too little water, not enough soil nutrients, etc. Diseases or insects can also cause the plants to die.
 
Cucumbers will also stop producing and die off if their fruit is allowed to mature fully--keep on picking, and don't allow any cucumbers to turn large and yellow.

As stated above, bitter cucumbers are usually due to inconsistent watering, especially low moisture. Water slowly in the morning or early afternoon, avoiding the leaves. During dry periods, water 1 to 1 1/2 inches of water in a single application. Apply a mulch, such as straw, shredded bark or newspaper to cool the soil and conserve moisture. You can also plant bitter-free cultivars.
Often (but not always), cutting off the stem-end and removing the skin of bitter cukes will remove much of the bitterness. 

Your cucumbers have powdery mildew fungi. Clip out leaves that show early spotting. For an organic solution, a milk spray works very well. There are also organic fungicidal sprays. Ask your garden center. It's also good make use of resistant varieties of cucumbers which make it difficult for powdery mildew to enter the leaves.
 

We only seed indoors to get a 2 or 3 week jump on the season. Once the soil is above 60 degrees F, you really should be seeding or growing outside. You can transplant your cuke and also try starting some new seeds. Just push 2 or 3 seeds an inch into the soil, spacing the plantings 18 to 36 inches apart. If the soil is moist and warm, the seedlings will pop out of the ground in a matter of days.

Damping off, a fungal disease, is a problem with young cucumber seedlings. Make sure your pots and soil are sterile and plant just a few seeds in a cup. For watering room temperature water is best and keep the soil just moist. Watering from the bottom sometimes helps. Air circulation is also important. Keep a small fan in the room if needed. Thin seedlings if they seem to be crowded in the cup or pot. Good luck!

Have you been fertilizing the plants? Too much nitrogen can stimulate lots of growth but no flowers. Cucumbers do need full sun so you may want to move the container back where it was. A normal cucumber plant will produce 10 to 20 male flowers for every female. Hopefully by now you may have some more blossoms.

Hand pollinate early in the morning--and only with freshly-opened blooms. Break off a male bloom, remove its petals and roll the pollen onto the stigma in the center of the female flower. You can also use a paintbrush to transfer the pollen from male to female. The female flower is the one with a bulbish shape (ovary) at the base and short stem. The male has a long, slender stem. The female flowers are larger.

Brown spots on leaves indicate a disease called anthracnose or Alternaria leaf spot. It can be controlled with chlorothalonil sprays applied every 10 to 14 days. Speak to your garden center.

Keep in mind that cucumbers need warm soil and constant water supply to germinate. You need a temperature range of 75 degrees to 80 degrees F during the day. At this optimum soil temperature, the seeds will take 7 to 10 days to germinate.