need zuke sprout pruning advice

[Todd]

Hi All,

My zuke seeds I planted eight days ago are starting to poke the through. Yes, I am a proud father!

I planted them three seeds to a hole. To my surprise, all three are coming through. (When I planted them two to a hole only one or none

Questions:

1) I presume I am suppose to only leave one per hole. Am I correct?

2) If I am to prune them out

a) I presume I leave the tallest one. Am I correct?

b) how big do I let them grow before pruning? Two inches?

c) how do prune? Use scissors and snip them of at the dirt line?

Many thanks,

-T

[David Hare-Scott]

The amount of growth will be limited by competition for water, nutrients and sun not the number of plants. If you left them all it would make little difference to the total just each would be smaller. If you want to thin them wait until the true leaves (not the cotyledons) appear and open, then choose the healthiest one and cut off the others. The main thing here is not to damage the chosen one.

It is said that you should only sow cucurbits directly as they resent transplanting. What they resent is root disturbance. You can avoid this problem and wasting seed by planting in tubes, the tapered square-section plastic kind about 12 cm (5 in) tall, that sit in a rack. They are often used to raise tree and shrub seedlings. Plant one seed per tube and plant out when the true leaves open. With care the soil plug with roots and all will slide out in one chunk and can be planted with no root disturbance.

D

[Todd]

Thank you!

[Higgs Boson]

TIA

HB

[Todd]

Hi David,

Question: which will get me more fruit? Three smaller plants crowding each other or one larger plant?

-T

[Brooklyn1]

There is no way to know for certain in advance especially without knowing the type of zuke plant; bush/vining?. Do you want a greater number of fruit or larger/heavier fruit? You'll get the greatest number of better quality fruit by harvesting often before the fruit become too large.. in the end by harvesting smaller fruit often there's a much better chance of ending up with more fruit by weight and also better quality fruit. It's best to harvest zukes when they're 4"-6" long, then the plant will keep putting out more in its quest to reproduce by producing viable seed... by allowing fruit to become large and seedy the plant will stop producing.

[Todd]

Hi Brooklyn1,

They are "Squash, Italian Ribbed Zucchini" A.K.A "Costata Romanesco".

I did notice that if you let the fruit get the size of a club (fun to scare the neighbors), that the plant will stop producing. Was told on this group that the plant thinks it is "finished".

I have been told if you want a lot of produce, to grow zucchini. "You'll have so many, you'll have to give them away." I think someone is pulling my leg. But I keep trying.

Now that you know the type of squash, do you think I should prune or leave all three sprouts?

Thank you for helping me with this.

-T

[Brooklyn1]

Depends how close together... sometimes if the sprouts are a half inch or more apart they can be carefully separated and all three planted. If they are right up against each other I'd save the best one and snip the other two. The best way to increase yield is to plant more zucchini, seeds are cheap. The best way to use up a bonanza of zucchini is slice them in half longitudinally, brush the cut surface lightly with olive oil and dust them with favorite seasonings; s n'p, and dago herb blend... then grill them. They'll be very tasty so will be consumed in quantity.

[David Hare-Scott]

As said above IMHO little difference.

D

[Todd]

Hi Brooklyn1,

They are pretty close together. So I will prune them as you suggested.

Oh now you are making me hungry! Store bought Zukes just don't taste the same.

Thank you for helping me with this.

-T

[Todd]

Hi David,

Thank you for the confirmation and the insights.

-T