Content
You should trim the leaves of zucchini every season, but it is important to decide when to do it. Practice shows that you mainly need to trim those leaves that interfere with the access of light, pollinators, as well as diseased and weakened parts of the plant.
Is it necessary to pick off the leaves of zucchini in open ground?
Some gardeners do not remove leaves from zucchini, believing that this will injure the plant. But you need to trim the foliage - there are several reasons for this:
- block the light;
- block access to pollinators;
- due to lack of sun, fewer flowers open;
- zucchini ripens more slowly, accumulates less sugars, and loses its taste;
- the lower leaves in contact with the soil rot and provoke the development of infection.
Why cut off excess leaves from zucchini?
As practice shows, trimming the leaves of zucchini is a mandatory procedure. This must be done for several reasons. For example, if the leaves are diseased, they should definitely be trimmed.In addition, this measure helps in the prevention of a number of diseases. There are other common reasons - they are described in detail below.
Helping pollinators
The first step in removing excess leaves from zucchini is to give bees and other pollinators unhindered access to the flowers. To do this, you should not cut off all the foliage, but only that which grows directly near the inflorescences.
Disease Prevention
Removing leaves from zucchini in open ground and in a greenhouse is also necessary for disease prevention. Foliage itself does not lead to the spread of infections. But the lower leaf plates can come into contact with the soil surface and gradually rot. They should be removed first - the remaining zucchini leaves that grow higher are simply left in place.
Access to sunlight
Another question is whether it is possible to remove leaves if the zucchini is overgrown with tops. This phenomenon is observed quite often, especially if the crops grow in good, fertile soil and are provided with normal care.
Foliage should be trimmed to ensure normal light access to the fruits.
If there are visually a lot of tops and they block access to sunlight, they must be removed. The fact is that the extra leaf plates literally block the rays, and the zucchini themselves ripen more slowly. This is especially true for regions with short summers (Ural, Siberia), where the first frosts may occur even in August.
To direct nutrients to fruits
Removing excess leaves from zucchini is also justified when there is too much green mass. In this case, they say that the shoots literally fatten, i.e. take up a significant portion of nutrients.
Before the stage of bud formation and flowering, this is quite normal - the plant should have time to get stronger. But after the ovaries and fruits begin to form, nutrients should be directed precisely to these parts of the plant. Therefore, excess leaves of zucchini must be trimmed. Otherwise the harvest will be mediocre.
Diseased leaves
It is very important to remove diseased leaves from zucchini, for example yellow ones. Diseased foliage should be pruned first, even if the flowering or fruiting phase is active. Immediately after this, the zucchini is treated with fungicides, insecticides or folk remedies. Moreover, both sick and healthy plants should be sprayed (for preventive purposes).
In this case, it is useful to carry out 1-2 fertilizing with complex mineral or organic fertilizer.
What leaves to pick from zucchini
If the foliage weakens due to diseases and pests, this will be noticeable by external signs:
- whitish coating, reminiscent of flour;
- holes on leaves;
- cobweb on the back side;
- spots of different shapes, sizes and colors;
- other damage, such as stripes.
Along with them, you also need to cut off too large leaf plates. There is no need to remove all of them - it is better to thin them out and remove them through one sheet. If light penetrates freely to flowers and fruits, other parts should not be trimmed.
Large leaves should be trimmed first
When to remove zucchini leaves
Experienced gardeners recommend cutting leaves in three stages:
- During flowering. As soon as the first inflorescences appear, primary pruning is carried out.This is done so that the sun's rays freely reach all the flowers. It is better to prune during the day, and the weather should be dry and not cloudy. Otherwise, the sections will dry out more slowly. During the first pruning, it is especially necessary to remove large leaves from zucchini, since they are the ones that most interfere with the access of light.
- During the formation of ovaries, foliage should be trimmed for sanitary purposes. Plants are inspected and, if necessary, plates with obvious signs of infection, insect attack, or simply weak, yellow ones are removed. All healthy parts are left in place.
- At the beginning of the fruiting stage, the foliage should be pruned a third time. This is the most important stage, when not only weakened leaves are removed, but also deformed ovaries.
How to properly remove leaves from zucchini
Leaf blades must be trimmed carefully so as not to damage the bush, otherwise the yield may decrease. To properly remove excess leaves from zucchini, proceed as follows:
- In young plants (seedlings), the plates are never removed. On the contrary, they need careful care and rapid growth of green mass. You can start cutting for the first time at least a month after transplanting the seedlings into open ground.
- When cutting, you should be especially careful when working with foliage that is located in the center of the plants. They are removed carefully so as not to damage future fruiting shoots.
- It is better to work with special scissors. If removed by hand, it may damage the plant. In addition, the cuts will turn out uneven, will look unsightly and will take a long time to become overgrown.
- Before using scissors, it is important to sharpen and disinfect the blades, for example, soak them in a 1% solution of potassium permanganate.
- The cut areas are treated with a solution of any fungicide or rubbed with charcoal powder.
- If most of the leaves are yellowed or covered with plaque, spots, or have other signs of disease, it is better to remove the entire branch. It also happens that almost the entire bush is affected. Then it needs to be dug up and destroyed, and the soil should be watered with a weak solution of potassium permanganate or fungicide.
Care after cutting off foliage
Any pruning is an injury to the plant, so after this procedure it is important to provide especially careful care for the plantings. Give water to zucchini 1-2 times a week, making sure that the soil layer remains slightly moist. If you mulch it with pine bark, straw, hay or sawdust, you can water less often. Organic matter enriches the soil, repels pests and inhibits the growth of weeds.
To get a good harvest, plants need to be fed at least three times per season.
Another important rule of care is the application of fertilizers. Feeding is given several times during the summer:
- Two weeks before flowering, the plantings are watered with a mullein solution diluted 10 times with water. To prepare, take 500 g of organic raw materials in a bucket of water (10 l) and leave for several days. This volume is enough for 3-4 plants.
- As soon as the first flowers appear, a second feeding is applied. You can give complex fertilizer according to the instructions or an infusion of wood ash (200 g per 10 l).
- A similar composition is added during the ripening of the first fruits. At this point, you should cut off the largest leaves that interfere with light access.
Another important rule of care is maintaining normal temperature. In the northern regions, especially in Siberia and the Urals, it is not always possible to influence this factor - frosts also occur in June.Therefore, it is optimal here to grow zucchini in a greenhouse or greenhouse. If this is not possible, young seedlings are covered with film. You need to cut holes in it for air access.
Conclusion
Zucchini leaves should be trimmed regularly, trimming 2-3 times per season. This is a useful procedure that has a good effect on flowering and productivity. Thanks to timely pruning, plants can be protected from pests and diseases.
