Just in time for our Saturday Sampler this week, some of the cucumbers in the garden are starting to bloom. Of course, we were hoping there might be some actual cucumbers by this weekend, but they have been a little bit pokey.

This is the ‘Tondo Liscia Manduria’ cucumber-melon that is in the Italian/Vertical garden. It hasn’t really started to vine yet, but it is blooming. Most of these blooms are the male flowers, but do you see those tiny, fuzzy, green blobs? Those are the buds of the female flowers getting started.

I’m going to guess that this first flush of flowers probably won’t result in more than one, maybe two cucumbers. Most of the flowers are male, and the timing might not work out to pollinate the female flowers once they open. It is very common for this to happen with the first flush of flowers, so if you are starting to see flowers on your cucumbers but no cucumbers yet, just be patient and wait for the flowers to sort themselves out.