Growing Cucumber

Cucumber has good demand in south Kerala, it is one among the main ingredient for Sambar, Pulisheri and other currys. Cucumber plant is almost like pumpkin plant which has male and female flowers. Only the female flowers will fetch the fruit.


Another large cucumber grown on roof top.

I planted 2 plants at a time, it require some space for the vines to spread around. plant stem does not look as the pumpkin plants. the stems ore thinner than the pumpkin plants.

In this image you can see 2 plants. I plan to spread the vines on the roof floor so managed to spread a sheet to protect the heat from the floor.

Plant started flowering in 25 days. I could find 8-10 flowers, however the flowers are male category, so these flowers may not give rise to a fruit.

This image shows a female flower with an ovary.
I could find 3-4 similar flowers.










Image shows the cucumber resting on the mat I think this will not grew in size much....lets wait and see.

Cucumber did not grow in bigger size, also the seed variety was not a hybrid one.

I plucked it as there was a threat from rodents. Because of constant attack by rodents on my roof, I lost few plants.

Tried another variety of cucumber and this time
 instead of planting on roof, I opted for ground.

The plant grew much healthier than the one that was 

grown on roof top.The reason could be that the plant

 is protected from direct and continuous sunlight.

It is better to provide little shade and also better to rest the fruit on dry leaves or some soft surface than just leaving it on ground.










After a month of plantation i could pluck one salad cucumber. 4-5 small cucumbers are still growing in size.