We arrived home from vacation Sunday and found these cucumbers in the garden:
I had never seen this happen to a cucumber, so I did a little research and it seems like it was probably because of staying on the vine too long! We have picked a normal, green cucumber since, and it was absolutely delicious, so I am hoping for lots more of the green variety the rest of the summer.
Have you ever had this happen to a cucumber? Or any other ideas about what went wrong?
I have no advice, but my cucumbers did the same thing last year. I found them oddly difficult to grow. They went from super small to super-yellow with nothing in between. Twas kinda frustrating.
ReplyDeleteIt depends on what type of cucumber it is. I help out in a community organic garden and a few weeks ago had the task of picking cucumbers. In particular a type called, I think, Sieben Bergische (or something like that). I was told that they should normally by picked when they are about 10-15cm long and not too thick but I also found one which was three times that size and probably nearly 10cm across. It was the most gorgeous mottled brown/yellow colour but I thought when I touched it that it would be all squishy as I thought it was rotting on the vine (yes, I'm very much still a beginner gardener). But it was fine. Our head gardener said they were a new (to him, it's actually a very old heirloom) type that he hasn't grown before and he had a taste of it and a taste of the one picked at just the right time (still green, smaller). He said the taste of the brown/yellow one was much better, a really interesting taste.
ReplyDeleteJust thought I'd add that. It seems from your post that the ones you are growing are normally supposed to be green but not all types are apparently.