How to Start Cucumber Plants in Cardboard Tubes
Starting cucumber plants indoors from seeds during the winter is a good way to get a jump start on spring gardening and a way to save money on plant starts. Seeds are economical and very little equipment is needed to successfully get cucumbers to grow. You can use recycled cardboard toilet paper and paper towel rolls instead of plastic pots and seed trays. Unlike plastic pots, cardboard tubes will degrade and can be planted directly into the groundm minimizing rootball damage to tender cucumber starts. Does this Spark an idea?
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Instructions
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Cut cardboard tubes into approximately 1 1/4- to 1 1/2-inch-long pieces. A toilet paper tube makes three pieces and a paper towel tube makes six pieces.
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Stand the tubes on their ends in a flat-bottomed nursery tray side by side so they are touching and can support each other.
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Fill each tube with seedling starting soil. Commercial mixes work or mix your own with one part peat and one part perlite.
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Poke a hole with your finger in the soil in the center of each tube. Place a cucumber seed in each hole and then cover it. The hole should be about two to three times as deep as the diameter of the seed.
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Pour about a quarter of an inch of water into the bottom of the tray. Monitor it closely as the cardboard and the soil soak up the water. Add more water, a little at a time as it gets soaked up, until the soil on the surface of the tubes is wet. Do not let any water stand in the bottom of the tray.
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Place the tray in a warm and bright location to germinate. Do not place it in direct sun; this may overheat the seeds. Keep the soil moist but not wet. Water from the bottom and let the soil and seeds soak it up rather than watering from the top, which may disrupt seed growth. You should see signs of life in about 10 days.
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Cucumber on the vine Place seedlings that have produced two leaves in a covered, shady space outdoors protected from the elements for a week; move them to a partially sunny location for a week; and then transplant them to full sun in the garden. This process of "hardening off" a plant acclimates it to the garden environment. Remove the cardboard tube when transplanting or leave it on; in the latter case, the roots grow out of the bottom and the cardboard tubes decomposes into the soil.
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Tips & Warnings
Sow the cucumber seeds about four weeks before the last frost of the season. This allows time for them to germinate, grow a little and get hardened off just in time to plant in the garden without having to hold the cucumber plants indoors too long.
Plant two seeds in each tube and pinch off the weaker one when you plant them into the ground. This increases the odds that each tube has at least one healthy plant.
Do not let the soil remain sopping wet. This causes rotting and fungal growth that can inhibit germination or kill the seedlings.
When planting the tubes in the ground, rip off any cardboard that sticks up above the soil surface because it can wick water away from the seedling during the crucial first few days after transplant.
References
- Photo Credit Ryan McVay/Digital Vision/Getty Images Cucumber image by Ilya Postnikov from Fotolia.com
