Same problem every year? There is a message from the Great Zuke Spirit there for you. Break the habit or switch to a bush variety!! ;-)

Seriously, you can trim off a few leaf stalks of the zucchini if you must but don't get carried away or you will be compromising the zucchini as well as the onions. Just cut the ones that are aggressively shading the onions. Cut them about 1" out from the base and then bury the cut ends with soil.

Dave

Haha I guess by "every year" I mean this is our second year in our current house and although we expanded the garden, still happening. Previous to this it was always container gardening. Honestly I am a pretty low maintenance gardener...I barely weed, don't fertilize really at all (though I do compost), and have to try very hard to water regularly (we have city restrictions but I have rain barrels). Regardless, everything I plant grows like crazy! I attribute it to having amazing gardener grandparents on both sides. So it still surprises me when my vegetables do so well, hence the underestimating of the growth of the zucchini plants.

I didn't even know there was a bush variety! Next year I will definitely look into that.

Thank you for the advice about trimming!

'I didn't even know there was a bush variety'.

Curiously, I had not realised there were vining zucchini until I started frequenting this US forum. Maybe because we tend have small gardens over here we only grow bush varieties. You need about 9 square feet per plant.

This looks promising for taming a bush zucchini.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNsq4V7Oaw8&feature=youtu.be

Get yourself one of these guys.... they do great at trimming extra zucchini leaves....

(I can make the joke because this is my video).

Seriously though I am usually in the same boat where the squashes are overrunning everything in their path. I've never had a problem just trimming the extra leaves here and there.

We're you able to catch the groundhog, Kevin? I've had better luck setting the trap near their borrow than in my garden. I've trapped out 14 of the little punks in two years. More just keep coming from surrounding areas though.

Ok I think that little guy is pretty cute! But I'm lucky and haven't had any wildlife issues. Yes the squash just go crazy! I'm doing pickling cucumbers this year and I'm sure they'll be taking over from the other side in no time.

I'm still trying to get the HUGE groundhog living under my barn. And the damn chipmunk living in my fenced garden. He ignores the rat trap baited with tasty seeds. (It's under a 5 gallon bucket set on 2 x 4's so no danger to birds.)

Try cantelope as bait for groundhogs. They go nuts over it. Squeeze some of the juice on the trap too and they will come right to it.

There are some threads over on the Square Foot Gardening Forum about staking and/or growing zucchini/squash vertically. Here is one.

Rodney