cucmbers

[melisa]

This is my first 'real' garden so I'm unsure of a lot. I have cucmbers that seem to be doing very well. However, there are some leaves turning yellow. I have also noticed tiny black ants and 'doodle'/pill bugs on them. I have just put up some stakes with twin hoping they will grow up instead of attacking everything around them. Will this help? Any suggestions?

[dragonfly]

If the plants are already pretty good sized, the pill bugs wont hurt them, but they do eat young seedlings readily. I planted cukes three times last year until I finally got some plants that could survive. The ants probably won't hurt anything either. With cukes in this area, I am always on the lookout for cucumber beetles. The most common one on my place is the spotted one. In small numbers, they don't seem to do much damage, but in large numbers they are a real problem. Lots of my leaves toward the bottom are turning yellow, but I am getting plenty of cucumbers, so I don't think it's anything to be concerned about. It may help to put something up that they can climb on, though. Cattle panels make great trellises, and are easy to put up if you use a plain t post in each end, and just wire the panel to it. They come in sixteen foot pieces, but I buy them at the tractor supply and if I ask, they cut them in half for me. Just look your plants over really well and be looking for anything else besides ants and pill bugs that could be doing damage.