Never heard of pruning them.
But, yes make it light on yourself.
Pinching the tender new growth should be the eases to do.
Or try one way on vine one & another on vine two.
See what works for you.

Could you provide a link to one of these videos you mention so we can see what you mean? I've never heard of any reason to prune them either and it is bound to reduce your production. It just doesn't seem logical given they are so easy to trellis. But Jolie is right - it is your plant to do with as you wish.

But I honestly can't picture what you mean by "when I remove the growth point, should i pluck it out like I see some people doing in videos" so seeing the video might help explain it.

Dave

The video is here, it is a similar method as to growing tomatoes up a string too http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGkFJh5bKGg
If you grow the tomatoes on a vertical support that is not a string - a trellis, or like myself, an arch, you won't need much pruning. They branch to cover the structure but seem to grow more up than out once they figure out how wide their support is.

The video is really talking about trellising in a greenhouse. I assume they are pruning to increase ventilation around the plant to cut down on disease. I really don't think it is necessary outdoors unless you're in a really moist environment and you want to try to prevent powdery mildew. I just use drip on my garden to do that.

The plants are in a container in a place where they get watered every night. Once the weather gets warm it will be ok, but that is proving to take a lot longer than usual.

To provide some background, I have 4 cucumbers crowded in about 15 gallons, the idea is that cucumbers do not produce in the arid heat of my area unless you crowd them to provide full shade for the roots and good dispersal of heat between 4 instead of the usual 2 plants. It is just a theory to get a bit more production in heat, but it requires you to prune them.

I am gardening in an apartment complex and I do not want them to get bushy in the first place, 3 of the 4 have two stocks, so even if I keep them to single stems there are 7 to trellis in a small space. By growing each with a dedicated string and keeping them single stems I can keep them well aerated and provide full shade.

If you watch the video it really looks like she is plucking the small growth points out, and then she explains to use a finger nail later on a larger one. I was just wondering about that, mostly.

Thanks
Phil

Here is a link that might be useful: Video I watched

That might work well in Maine, but in Oklahoma I think I might benefit from keeping the leaf cover.

I've never heard of it outside. Let us know what happens.

Dan

I should have stated, I am in Central California, 9b. You dont get away with cucumbers in containers around here easily, so I am experimenting.

I just wanted to know about plucking versus pinching growth points.

-Phil

You can do both. When the growth point is small it's easy to to bend sideways and break so you can pluck it out but once it's gotten too big the stem gets fibrous and stringy so you have to pinch it or clip it. It's the same with tomatoes.

Gotcha, thank you shebear!

I've heard of doing this. My mother told me about it . In one of her Chinese gardening books they describe doing it and the purpose was to redirect energy to producing fruit rather than vines.

Thanks for bringing this up. She told me about it but I never knew which leaves you were suppose to prune.

Cool, lnewport, glad to hear somebody else has finally heard of it! It seems valid to me, because all of the growth points are in the shade until they get quite large, so they are not photosynthesizing much until they use a lot of energy. I have a trellis with a dedicated piece of twice for each stem, I plan to use Velcro straps and keep them trained nicely. They will need maximum aeration getting sprinkled heavily every night by the wasteful idiots at the landscaping company.

Right now it is 45 degrees at night and they run for about 30 minutes 7 nights a week. Good thing I used a quick draining medium!