The following aspects are important to remember when pruning cucumbers: A plant that is overworked (or overgrown) can never regain lost vigour, not even with additional nutrients or foliar feeding. Not only will the yields be high, but the percentage of marketable fruit will also be high, and the percentage class 1 fruit will be higher. If this balance can be kept optimally, high yields will be achieved. There should be a fine balance between fruit load and growth. One fruit can make a difference, that is the problem and that is how sensitive cucumbers are. It is easy to understand why, no grower likes to through money away and if advised to remove some fruit, the grower assumes you are crazy or they are perpetual optimists and think that one fruit will not make a difference. This is probably one of the most neglected activities. Pruning cucumbers also involves the removal of fruit. This implies removing all side shoots developing as explained under the sections in tomatoes and peppers.

Initially the crop is only allowed to grow one stem. By removing more the plant can go in a state of shock and abort fruit, drop flowers and produce crooked fruit. Never remove more than one leaf at a time. Never remove leaves in the same way as in a tomato crop. Some leaves are also removed to improve ventilation between crops. The only time when pruning cucumbers is essential is when leaves are damaged due to movement in the aisles and disease or insect damage. The more leaves are left on the plant the more the plant can photosynthesise and more energy there is for fruit production.

The amount of leaves that should be removed is comparable with peppers and brinjals.Ĭucumber yield can be correlated with total leaf area. However, they should not be pruned as prudently as tomatoes. Pruning cucumbers is essential for optimum growth and quality of fruit. However, they do require large amounts of good light in order to produce good quality fruit. These systems allow for easy picking and identifying the fruit. Other systems such as the Inclined Training System (ITS) and Guernsey Arch Method (GAM) need skilled labour to establish but requires less maintenance once the plants have grown over the arch. The easiest to apply are the vertical training systems using the URS pruning method. Each system has its advantages and disadvantages according to the ability and managerial skill of the grower, the experience of his labour, capital available to build the various structures, climatic conditions of the area etc. The question arises which system should be used.

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