Our fourth and final cucumber planting is currently climbing its way to the high tunnel rafters. While the field-grown cucumbers are largely left to their own devices, the tunnel cucumbers are a very orderly affair. The plants are pruned to a single stem in order to tie them up more easily. The vertical growing habit helps improve air flow in the hot and humid greenhouse climate and makes for easy pickings of clean, straight fruit.
Our tunnel selection is more pared down than our field plantings: we’re growing a pickling variety, a standard slicing variety, and a longer Japanese-style cucumber (see above). All three are parthenocarpic, meaning they do not require pollination to produce fruit. Since the cucumbers don’t need bees or other pollinators to find them, we do somewhat regular applications of kaolin clay–a powdered clay used to deter cucumber beetle feeding.
While this isn’t the first season we’ve grown cucumbers in a high tunnel, it is our first attempt to do it properly. If you get a cucumber over the next few weeks, there’s a good chance it came off one of the plants pictured above. Fingers crossed for an extended harvest!