Planting Some Cucumber Seeds

Well it's been several years since I had a garden. I still have a bunch of seeds and my Mom has been joking about me growing her some cucumbers again so I figured what the heck. I still have all my seeds from back then and I managed to pick up 4 packs of last years seeds for a dollar at of all places the auto parts store. Went to Wallmart on Monday and picked up a 2 cubic foot bag of Miracle Grow potting mix. Dug out my old seeds, the new ones, my starter pots and some labels.

The starter pots are just the throw away ones you get when you buy flowers. I saved them and the flats they came in over the years. They stack nicely so don't take much room.

There are a lot more than just cucumber seeds here but I doubt I will plant much else. Maybe a few green onions. The jelly jar is full of marigold seeds I picked and dried. Maybe try a couple of pots of those. Think the mason jar has baby Lima beans in it so might try just tossing a few of those in the ground and see if anything comes up.

This bottle is full of labels I made back when I was really into the garden. Well more the outdoor drinking beer something to do then a garden but it was a big one. Made these just using an old word processor. They are just regular 8 1/2 x 11 printer paper cut into strips. I covered them with clear contact paper so they wouldn't get wet and become unreadable. I tried painted Popsicle sticks but the paint just doesn't hold up to the water.

Pulled out a few different types. My Mom lives the Sugar Crunch ones but they were really hard to find and being a hybrid you can't just save the seeds as they don't germinate. So I used up the last of those. Some packs are the new ones others from 6+ years ago. If they grow they grow. If not well no big loss.

I seeded several pots of each with 2-4 seeds per pot depending on how many seeds and how old they were. Better to have too many than too few. Can always plant more pots or give the seedlings away.

I managed to plant 4 flats before it started to get too chilly and looked like it was going to rain. I didn't water them because it was supposed to rain for the next 4 days. Of course it hasn't yet so I might water them if it doesn't rain by tonight. Had to move them to the bigger table. Steemit one only holds 3 flats.

Finally covered them with screen. This serves 3 functions. First it keeps the birds from eating the seeds. Second it keeps heavy rain from making a big mess out of them. And third it gives the new seedlings a bit of shade so the leaves don't burn. I usually start them under the porch or inside but I'm planning on cleaning that in the next few days. I do have a nice set of starter shelves around the corner of the house but they are currently full of junk. I'll move them out there as soon as I can clean that up a bit. Right now there are a few old bags of potting mix on top of them that I will make use of for transplanting these. Problem is the bags are old and split open from the sun dry rotting them.

Hopefully I will have some cucumbers by the middle of June. I'll try to remember to do follow up posts of the transplanting and harvesting.