My Asian cukes are bitter now, they have lots of moisture, so I'm thinking it partly heat and partly a characteristic of the variety. Cutting the ends off and peeling doesn't do any good - bitter, bitter, bitter, yuke!
If your cukes are still tasty and sweet which varieties are you growing? Inquiring minds want to know!!!
Thanks for Sharing,
Jo
Bitter Cukes - How are Yours?
No problems here. Driest hottest spring I have ever encountered, but I planted the cukes in partial shade and water them deeply once a week. Disease free and growing like gangbusters. Talladega, Early Fortune, Thunderbird and Olympian. Bitterness is usually caused by stress. I rarely have it unless the cuccumber beetles outsmart me.
I bet it's the drought and heat that's making them bitter.
no problema here.
I am harvesting about 10 cukes every other day.
I heard bitterness is caused by not enough watering.
I had tons of cucumbers last year, but not a sweet one in the lot. All very bitter and astringent, despite partial shade and copious watering. I ended up chopping and shredding them in the blender and pouring them on the compost pile. The worms probably loved me, anyway.
I didn't even bother planting them this year.
Sometimes it's the variety and your soil type that also affect the taste of the cuke. I grew Lemon Cukes last year and they were really prolific and very tasty. I also grew some White Wonders. They were gross!
My nephew down in Louisiana called a week ago complaining about the bitter cukes I told him it was just the weather ,mine have all but slowed to a crawl (burpless) but I have some mor coming on right away (Marketmore76s)and have some lemon cukes just coming up for my late cukes,my DW is a fanatic about her cukes so I try and keep her supplied all sommer .Y'all know thw saying"when Mama ain't happy ain't nobody happy" Nuff said?