Growing zuccini with vertical gardening is simple. In our garden, we stack 5 pots over a height of 2 feet from the ground. The zuccini can occupy all plant sites, or can be mixed with other plants like cucumbers, tomatoes and lettuce.
Germinating the Seeds
A good time to start planting zuccini is 3-4 weeks before the last frost date.
Like most plants, we place the seeds in 72-cell seedling flats using a mix around 90% peat and 10% vermiculite. Then, we cover them with a 1/8-inch layer of vermiculite or 50/50 mix of peat moss and vermiculite.
After that, we moisten the top layer with a pump sprayer, place them onto a heat pad with a clear 4-inch dome cover and wait 7-14 days until the first seeds germinate.
Once they germinate, we turn on the lights and keep them 3-inches above the tops of the young plants throughout their time under the lights.
At the 3 week or 4 weeks old stage, we can move the plants outdoors and allow them to get acclimatized to natural light. We can start by giving no direct sunlight for the first couple of days and gradually allow more sunlight.
Alternatively, we can put them in a greenhouse or coldframe and move them in and out to get used to sun too.
Once we have them ready for their final home, we can transplant them into our garden or pots. If we grow in a vertical garden with pots, they will grow downwards and can handle the heavy vegetables.
During the season, we can prune the male flowers and leave the female flowers. The male flowers will be thinner by comparison and this will be very obvious.
In addition, a feeding program with a good plant food, or hydroponic mix around 1100-1500 ppm will work great. However, with stacked pots, we must ensure all levels get direct drip irrigation to ensure adequate nutrition for all levels of pots.
Otherwise, if we only feed the top pot and let the fertilizer run through, the lower pots could be left with far less fertilizer.
For the easy part, we pick them when they are ready and enjoy tasty soups, or whatever we had in mind with our member of the squash family.
