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I'm learning to garden and have successfully grown bottle gourd and zucchini. I also planted cucumbers but they are turning yellow and I cannot figure out what is wrong. I have looked at a variety of information on the Internet and some of it is conflicting.

For example, in this video yellow is because of rain, while in this video yellow is because of sun. The place where I have planted this gets sunlight directly three hours a day. And then the rest of time it is in shade. The weather here is 90-100°F (32-38°C). There have been showers every evening for about 30 minutes for the past three days but the cucumbers started turning yellow even before that.

There are links which say that there may be problems with magnesium deficiency and also nitrogen. So I have sprayed it with epsom salt and also provided the NPK mixture. It does not make any difference. I'm attaching a photograph of one of the cucumbers that is turning yellow.

The other vegetables like bottle gourd and zucchini are planted in different beds a few feet away and they are growing nicely. Both have the same kind of soil.

So it is pretty perplexing.

enter image description here

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  • How big/old is the plant?
    – Wayfaring Stranger
    May 5, 2018 at 15:29
  • If this happens year after year, you might try Armenian cucumbers instead. They're actually muskmelons (so, they prosper in some conditions that aren't ideal for cucumbers). I recommend Metki Dark Green Serpent, personally. Metki melons are Armenian cucumbers.
    – Brōtsyorfuzthrāx
    May 6, 2018 at 3:45
  • How much light do they have? Pollinators like plenty of light (I'm thinking lack of pollination might be what a lot of people would guess). Many pests tend to like shade. I might guess a phosphorus and/or potassium and/or organic matter and/or sunlight deficiency, but that's just a guess.
    – Brōtsyorfuzthrāx
    May 6, 2018 at 3:49
  • Thank you for your comments - I got the plant from a nursery on April 7 2018. I will check for Armenian cucumbers also. The light that they get is about 3 hours a day direct. I already added N-P-K 20-20-20 a fistful and am assuming that should take care of any deficiency.
    – Desi Mazdur
    May 6, 2018 at 11:49

1 Answer 1

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This looks like what we in the UK call "blossom end rot". It occurs to all cucurbits and seems to affect the earlier fruits in the season. I've heard it blamed on environmental conditions (cold evenings causing condensation inside the flowers) and also a shortage of calcium. It appears to actually be something to do with calcium transport inside the plant, but in any case, in my experience at least, it tends to resolve itself with time/warmer weather and your subsequent fruits will probably turn out fine.

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  • thank you. I will wait for more fruits to appear then. Thank you also for all the comments directly to my question. I was not able to respond directly there and so adding this in this section Thank you for your comments - I got the plant from a nursery on April 7 2018. I will check for Armenian cucumbers also. The light that they get is about 3 hours a day direct. I already added N-P-K 20-20-20 a fistful and am assuming that should take care of any deficiency.
    – Desi Mazdur
    May 6, 2018 at 11:50
  • The cucumbers have finally grown. So ignoring the fate of the first set of cucumbers was good. Marking this as the right answer. I am facing however another problem and that is to do with only the female flowers appearing on cucumber. That is not the case with the bottle gourd flowers where I was able to get about 30% more year to just by hand pollinating. I'm going to put out a separate question for this. Also the fruit is actually English cucumber. thespruceeats.com/english-versus-regular-cucumbers-2355806
    – Desi Mazdur
    May 19, 2018 at 6:01
  • I have frequently seen cucubrits that grow only male flowers. This is a stress response to the plant's location not being optimal (for any number of reasons: lack of light, water, space etc.) Presumably this is because if the location is not optimal, it is disadvantageous to drop seeds there. Are you sure they're female flowers and not male?
    – David Liam Clayton
    May 19, 2018 at 6:20
  • Thank you for your comment. They appear to have only female flowers as all of them have a tiny cucumber attached to them. Can a male flower also have a tiny cucumber?
    – Desi Mazdur
    May 19, 2018 at 7:11
  • This is the question that I posted about female floweres gardening.stackexchange.com/questions/38736/…
    – Desi Mazdur
    May 19, 2018 at 7:12

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