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Q SICKLY SIGHT

I struggle to grow cucumbers and gherkins. Last year, my plants had white fly and powdery mildew. This year, the leaves have dry brown spots and tatty cracked edges, and a few baby cucumbers dropped off before maturing. I can't see any sign of insects. How can I get a good crop? MIKE HARRIS, AUCKLAND

AGrowing cucumbers can be a challenge in humid weather or cool spring conditions. They need a bit more coddling than their easy-to-grow relatives courgettes, but aren’t as fussy as melons.

The dry, cracked leaves and loss of immature fruit indicates a fungal disease called leaf spot. If the plant is fairly mature, you may still get a crop, but pick them as soon as possible – when still small, yet big enough to be worth eating.

Try spraying with copper oxychloride fungicide. It’s a preventative rather than a cure, but could help keep new growth free of disease long enough for some cucumbers to mature. Keep spraying every two weeks, and remember the one-day withholding period.

Don’t compost diseased material – burn or dispose of it in the rubbish. And reduce the chances of fungal diseases next season by rotating your crops. Allow two or more years before planting cucumbers (or their relatives watermelons, squash and pumpkins) in the same soil.

Cucumbers like hot, mostly dry conditions, good airflow and low humidity. Plant them in a sunny spot with loose, friable soil and good drainage. Don’t plant out seedlings too early; late October or November is soon enough, especially if spring gets off to a late start.

Grow cucumbers up a trellis or teepee to keep them off the ground and increase air movement. Water them deeply but not too often, without wetting the leaves. Barbara Smith Every time I pick up a coil, my kinky hose bends and blocks itself. Straightening it out is like fighting a snake! In winter, it breaks into small sections in the frost. I'm hesitant to buy an expensive one as it might be no better. What do you recommend? NIK RAKELS, NELSON

AGood-quality hoses are worth every penny. They’re long-lasting if you look after them – Gardena’s Premium hose has a 30-year warranty.

A new hose retains a ‘memory’ of the coil it was shaped into during the packaging process, so knots and kinks can form when the hose tries to reform its original coil. To avoid this, lay out a new hose (full of water with both ends closed off) in a straight line in the sun for a day to remove the packaging bends.

Store your hose in a shaded spot and keep it inside in winter, out of reach of frost. Don’t leave a hose under pressure when not in use – turn off the tap. Don’t drive over or step on a hose laid out on a path, and avoid dragging it over rough edges. Avoid contact with harsh chemicals too. Coiling a hose and storing it on a hose reel or hanger will also help to prolong its life. No hose is completely bend free and even the most expensive may not have the best kink resistance. A cheap hose can have a excellent kink resistance, but that may be because it contains a lot of toxins (BPA, phthalates or heavy metals) to make it soft.

Choose a good quality, toxin-free hose and look after it carefully. You’ll experience less frustration and save money in the long run. Katharina Fischbach, Gardena

Q ROTTEN LUCK

What's wrong with our ‘Cox's Orange Pippin’? It’s only two or three years old. Much of the fruit was lost during a hail storm and now the remaining apples are becoming diseased. BEV MANERA, ROSS

AThis is a good example of botrytis rot at the calyx (blossom) end of the apple. This is a post-blossom infection. It can occur during wet spring weather, which most areas of the county had last year.

The recommended treatment is a copper spray at leaf fall in autumn (coating the tree and the ground underneath), then again pre-bud burst next spring (so mid-late August, depending on the weather). After blossoming in late spring, do a follow-up spray with Kiwicare Thiram Fungas Control or Tui Disease Eliminator for Fruit & Veges (a ready-to-use spray).

Now that your apple trees have the disease, it’s important to control the spores to avoid repeat infection. All of the infected fruit should be removed from the tree and the ground prior to the autumn leaf fall spray.

Given the main infection time is immediately after flowering, when the fruit is developing, there isn’t a high risk of further infection in the other fruit. However, you could use the Kiwicare spray up to seven days before you harvest – though take care to wash the fruit well before eating. Kate Marshall, Waimea Nurseries Q QUIET, PLEASE We live by a busy road – can you recommend a dense, noise-reducing hedging plant? Preferably three to five metres tall. We have a fence, but it’s still really noisy. HANNAH MAY, BAY OF PLENTY

ASound experts say that impermeable barriers of concrete or wood work better than hedges to deflect noise. Trees and shrubs provide the psychological impression of less noise (and also absorb air pollution, block wind and provide shade) but in order to be effective as noise barriers a “hedge” would need to be a dense, small-leaved evergreen with foliage right to the ground, that was tall and 7.5-9m thick (at least!). Plus it would need to extend down the sides of the property as well as along the road. This is unlikely to be possible in the suburbs, but on a lifestyle block you can use several rows of hedges interplanted with shrubs to reduce decibel levels by up to 50%. Suitable plants include Thuja

occidentalis ‘Smaragd’, the golden totara Podocarpus totara ‘Aurea’, or the blue-green totara ‘Matapouri Blue’. If your site is coastal and hit by salty winds, try karo ( Pittosporum

crassifolium), cold-tolerant Pittosporum ralphii ‘Stephens Island’, Olearia

lineata, or Griselinia littoralis . The sound of trickling water can distract you from other noises, so install a fountain or water bubbler while your hedge is establishing. Barbara Smith