Pruning tomatoes and cucumbers

[rmonge00]

Hello everyone,

I have tomatoes and cucumbers growing in my greenhouse and they are both huge right now!! I haven't done any pruning so far, but the plants are getting so big and bushy that I am thinking that I should have.... Can I still take suckers off of the tomato plants, even though they are big and thick and starting new plants of their own? Will this encourage disease? Can I prune the cucumbers? How do I do this? Do I just start cutting back some of the vines?

Thanks,

Ryan

 

[dickiebird]

I've never pruned cucumbers but I prune tomatos in the green house all the time and no matter how large they are it never seems to hurt them.

THANX RICH

 

[desertlady]

Ive never prune the cucumbers, I only trimmed the dead ends off, Last time my vine got the end broke off and killed it ! So I am afraid to prune them ! So I just let them go wild ! Maybe someone else knows better then me !

 

[Smart Red]

I do prune my tomato plants as they grow - I first stake them then prune any leaves that would touch the ground. I also pinch out most of the tiny leaves that grow in the leaf node as they will grow into fruiting branches if left. Once the plant is about 3 ft. tall I quit pinching anything above that height, but continue to keep the growth that would touch the ground off the plant. Sometimes that is no more than cutting part of a leafing section off rather than removing the whole thing.

Cukes I have never pruned. When they (or any vining plant) start overgrowing their space, I do turn the rambling growth back on itself to keep the area confined. I also grow my cukes up on four foot fencing to save space.

Love, Linn B (aka Smart Red) Gardening in zone 4b-5a, newly 5b? -- anyway, Im still in the same spot in south-est, central-est Wisconsin