To be clear, there were 5 vines total, untrellised and grown in very fertile and very light soil (my garden is a former cattle holding pen). Further, the variety is called Mideast Prolific, and from what I hear and have seen it is called Prolific for a very good reason. Had I taken the time to trellis, pick at prime maturity (I let quite a few go too large), and did not have problems with cucumber beetles, then I can only imagine how many I whould have harvested. I think then that keys to a good consistent harvest are: 1. luck 2. trellis (lends a better fruit as well) 3. plant in mounds of well dug, fertile soil 4. give them lots of room - I had mine on 4 foot centres and even that was a touch crowded 5. black plastic to warm the soil early on - I also used pop bottle cloches to get them started well 6. pest control - if you figure out how to get rid of cucumber beetles, let me know 7. good weather - lots of water 8. luck If anyone is looking for the seed source, I have included the link to an heirloom/rare seed specialist in my area (zone 5). And just in case you were wondering, the Mideast Prolifics are very good cucumbers. About a 7.5/10 on taste, 8.5/10 on skin, and about 1.5 week shelf-life in the fridge before they turn into grocery store quality cukes. Did not try any pickling for the record. Cheers! Here is a link that might be useful: The Cottage Gardener - Cucumbers

My beans usually get covered but they don't usually get really bad until just about the time we're through picking beans for the season. This year I've planted bush beans which are flowering now and pole beans which come later. I too would like to keep them under control. I usually end up pulling up the plants at the end of the season and burning them along with the larvae that ate all of the leaves. If I use a row cover how would the beans get pollinated? Iv'e only seen a few beetles so far and have hand picked them but like cucumber beetles they drop off the plant if you're not fast enough. I don't want to spray anything because I have 6 honey bee hives in the back yard. Do these beetles have any predators?

Hi All! I have several raised beds and one has Canna and Four O'clocks. When the Jap' beetles arrived just over a week ago I began picking them off. At first first there were only 5 or 10. Then last weekend the amounts began to grow slightly. It was the first real beetle infestation I've had since we moved here 4 years ago. I had a metal Jap' beetle catcher from way back, along with a can of scent. I hung it in the middle of the bed on Monday eve. On Tuesday morning before leaving for out of town, I went to check to see if it was catching. I couldn't believe it. Without to much exaggeration there must have been 500 in the small 4 X 8 area. The pungent scent on Tuesdas hot humid morning must have drawn them to the catcher, with a quick stopover to the plants, from all of my neighborhood, and there was only 1 or 2 inside the catcher. Boy what a screw up that was. Well it's taken me almost a week of picking and drowning to get it under control. I began culling off all the hundreds of leaves they destroyed over the weekend. I had 1 beautiful Hollyhock in the bed that I left that came up from seed. All that's left are the Maroon blooms. I'm going to leave it to see how resilient a plant can be. Last year we had a Maple tree that was infested with the small inch caterpillar and I swear I was going to cut the tree down as we couldn't even use the hot-tub because of the droppings. I'm not that heartless so I'm leaving the Hollyhock as is because I swear the tree has come back stronger than ever. Of course the Holly won't have that chance for next year. But isn't Nature amazing? Jim

Eddie--Since the USDA took over, we have a National Organic Program (NOP), that requires that certified organic growers use certified organic seed (from certified organic plants). Many growers dropped out of the program--a supply of certified organic seeds was not in place, and they're still quite expensive. Nevertheless, it does have merit. Seems that about 90% of the seeds sold in the world come from a few large companies, which scares some. Didn't even remember I had a trade list--thanks for updating me.