If you’re looking for the most productive crop of all, it’s hard to beat the ever-dependable zucchini! This famously prolific veggie yields fruits all summer long, but sometimes they can throw us a curve ball. It can sometimes be tricky to set fruit, especially early in the season.
But worry not – with the tips I’m about to share, you can make sure your plants are fruit-pumping machines!
How to Sow Zucchini
Sow zucchini at any point from midspring till midsummer. They grow so fast that, in many climates, even a summer sowing should leave enough time to get plenty of fruits well before the cold returns.
For the quickest start, carefully clip the edge of the hard seed with nail clippers. Just snip the very edge, so you don’t damage the little seedling embryo inside. The aim is to penetrate the seed coat just enough that moisture finds it easier to get in, which will speed up germination. The longer a seed sits in potting mix or soil, the more likely it is to rot, so anything we can do to speed up the process improves the chances of healthy young seedlings.
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Poor pollination can cause fruits to begin to rot as they start to grow
Don’t worry if you’re not confident about this step – this is just something I do to hurry things along. The seeds are still very likely to germinate without doing this if they’re nice and warm.
Sow zucchini into large plug trays or small pots. The chunky seeds produce equally chunky seedlings, so they need plenty of space right from the start. To sow, dib a hole about an inch (2cm) deep, then pop the seed in and cover it back over. Sow the seed on its edge to prevent water sitting on top of the seed and potentially causing it to rot (not such a problem at this rapidly warming time of year).
Zucchini, like other members of the squash family (cucurbits) such as melons and cucumbers, germinate super quickly given somewhere comfortably warm and with consistently moist potting mix. And once they’re up they’ll just rocket away!
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Zucchini grows big - fast!
They can reach planting size within three weeks of sowing – sometimes even two – so don’t be tempted to sow them too early in the season. Wait until it’s nice and warm and make sure you can easily protect the seedlings from cool nights, either with a few layers of a fleece row cover, or just by bringing them indoors overnight. Ideally, we want to avoid temperatures below about 50ºF (10ºC) for too long.
Because zucchini grows so fast, we have an opportunity to get clever with when we sow them. I find that older plants can become riddled with powdery mildew, so one option is to make your first sowing about two weeks before your last frost date to have plants ready to go out once the risk of frost has passed, then follow this with a second sowing two months later to give vigorous new plants to set out from midsummer. That way, once the first plants start slowing down, there are new ones waiting in the wings to replace them.
Or try sowing more regularly than this – say, once a month – to give a steady supply of live-fast, die-young plants that’ll throw out fruits like a horticultural tommy gun!
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Plant zucchini into rich soil to make sure they have the energy to produce plenty of fruits
How to Plant Zucchini
You know summer’s arrived when it’s time to plant your zukes! With spring waning and with the last of the frosts behind us, it’s time to transplant.
Zucchini are heavy feeders. They (and other squash-family plants) are often seen thrusting out from compost heaps, so it’s very hard indeed to give them too much in the way of nutrients. Dig nice, deep holes for your plants, then fill the bottom with a half bucket-load of garden compost.
Return some of the soil and tickle in a little organic fertilizer, for instance blood, fish and bone. (There are non-animal-derived alternatives if you prefer.) Pop in your seedling then, using the rest of the soil you excavated, make a raised ring around the plant. Water into this ring. The banked-up soil will hold the water in place so it has time to percolate down into the soil around the roots, rather than just running off across the surface. It’s a simple but effective way to make the most of every drop, so nothing’s wasted.
By growing several plants together you’ll dramatically improve pollination rates. This is because it increases the likelihood that both male and female flowers are open at the same time. It will also make it easier for buzzing bees to whip about between blooms. They work hard, so it’s worth trying to make their life a bit simpler as they help to make sure we get plenty of fruits! Aim for at least two plants in close proximity. It doesn’t matter if they’re different varieties. But don’t plant too many, because all being well these guys are going to produce a LOT of fruits!
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Pretty zucchini flowers are a bonus gourmet crop
One thing I should mention at this point is that it’s very common to get only male flowers early in the season, while plants are still bulking out and finding their feet. Please don’t worry about this – it’s quite normal and the female flowers will follow in good time. And if you have lots of male flowers you could always pick them for eating. (Keep reading to find out what to do with them!)
It’s just about warm enough to plant out in my garden now, but nighttime temperatures can still dip a bit lower than warmth-loving zucchini is comfortable with. A simple trick to help plants transition to their new home is to either cover them with a row cover of fleece, or just cut the bottom off a soda bottle or milk jug and pop it over the plant. Bury it into the soil a little so it doesn’t just blow off, and shove a cane down through the top into the soil so it definitely can’t go anywhere. Leaving the cap off will help with airflow so it doesn’t get too hot in there during the day, but it should still keep off the chill at night.
Remove covers once the plants have grown big enough to need the extra space, and certainly by the time they start flowering so bees can access the blooms. In the meantime, as well as offering a little extra warmth, covers should also somewhat protect the young plants from slugs.
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Early-maturing zucchini varieties can help sidestep pests such as squash bugs
Beat Zucchini Pests
If you live somewhere that suffers from either squash bugs or borers, firstly I empathize! These insects can gorge on your plants, making leaves ragged, reducing fruiting or, worse still, killing the plants off entirely.
The easiest way around this is to try and get a harvest as soon as possible, before these bothersome bugs rear their unwanted heads from about midsummer. Pick a super-fast-maturing, early variety and get it planted as soon as you dare. Something that matures in less than 50 days is ideal. Many seed packets will detail how long it takes to go from seed to harvest-time.
With any luck you’ll get plenty of pickings before they turn up but, as soon as you spot them, cover your plants with insect-barring row covers. This will keep pollinating bees out too, so you’ll need to lift the covers every few days to hand-pollinate them.
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With the right care, zucchini will grow vigorously
Growing Zucchini: 3 Things to Get Right
Zucchini is super keen and will almost certainly do you proud. But there are a few things to keep an eye on to get the best from them.
1. Watering
Firstly, keep plants well watered in dry weather. This is really important to support that rapid growth and, of course, plentiful fruits. Overly dry soil followed by a period of wet is also a major cause of powdery mildew – that fungal disease that causes white blotches on the leaves. So aim for consistent soil moisture and consider adding a mulch of something like grass clippings to slow evaporation from the soil.
2. Prevent Powdery Mildew
Good airflow between plants will help reduce the risk of plants getting powdery mildew, and the best way to do that is to avoid planting too closely together. You can train vining varieties so they don’t crowd each other, or even direct them up supports. Plants can get really quite big, but our Garden Planner can help you get the perfect spacing for them.
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Powdery mildew can be prevented with a homemade milk spray
As a preventative measure against powdery mildew, try this natural homemade milk spray. Mix one part cow’s milk to nine parts water and spray it over the leaves, covering both sides. Do this in the morning if possible, and on a still, dry day. Repeat every few weeks. If you do get powdery mildew, cut off the worst-affected leaves. The newer leaves are likely to be unaffected and will grow to replace those taken off.
Older plants inevitably decline as they become increasingly afflicted with mildew – the zucchini equivalent of arthritis! This is one reason why making multiple sowings throughout the season can help because you can simply remove infected plants as new ones come on-stream.
3. Feeding
There should be enough fertility in the soil from the compost you added at planting time, but there’s certainly no harm in giving plants an additional boost by tickling in a top-dressing of balanced organic fertilizer a month or two after planting.
You can also water on a liquid tomato feed or a seaweed feed every couple of weeks once they start to flower to make sure they have all the nutrients they need to produce plenty of those delectable fruits.
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Zucchini is famously productive
How to Harvest Zucchini
Once plants start fruiting, there’s no stopping them! The secret to keeping them coming is to harvest regularly, picking them while they’re still quite young. These younger fruits have much denser flesh and far superior flavor, making it hard to tire of them! In fact, regularly picking young, firm fruits no more than about 6in (15cm) long is a great way to avoid getting overwhelmed by too much. Just don’t let them reach marrow size or plants will really slow down, thinking they’ve achieved their goal and don’t need to produce any more fruits.
Plants and fruits can be quite spiny, so you might want to wear gloves when harvesting, or opt for a spineless variety.
Oh, and my little tip for enjoying the glut of male flowers early on in the season? Stuff them with ricotta and lots of parsley, seal them back up, then dip the stuffed flowers in a batter and deep-fry them. This was a total revelation to me when I visited Italy a few years ago – it’s called fiore di zucca and, my word, it’s so tasty it’ll blow your mind!
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With so many zucchini varietiess available, you'll never get bored of growing them!
Like many things you grow yourself, there’s way more choice of varieties for the gardener – from round or yellow fruits to your common-or-garden (but no less tasty) standard green zukes. It’s nice to have something colorful on the plate but, honestly, the most prolific plants are your standard green zucchini, so if sheer quantity of fruits is your goal, then opt for one of these.
Once zucchini hits its stride, keeping up can be tricky! Try them sweated off in a little butter, steamed, or even grated to make a cake. But if you do find you’ve got more than you can handle, don’t forget National Sneak Some Zucchini Onto Your Neighbor’s Porch Day. I kid you not – I promise I haven’t made this up! This year it runs on August 8th.
