BY L.A. JACKSON

Q: L.A., do you have any suggestions on how to grow cucumbers? Do you let them run on the ground or do you have them growing around a stake going up? Thank you. – Leslie Nicholls

Leslie, being a fan of Clint Eastwood's early Westerns, I like to hang 'em high. Getting the cukes off the ground keeps them cleaner and makes it less likely bugs will mess with them. And I think having them swinging in the breeze instead of lying on the sun-parched earth keeps them slightly cooler and improves their taste. You can run them up a stake if you want, but an easy cucumber trellis to make is to build a wood frame of 2-by-2-inch lumber into the shape of a pup tent about 6 feet tall and then, leaving the inverted Vs open, put 1-inch diameter chicken wire or 2-by 4-inch fence wire on the long sides. That'll give the cukes plenty to grab onto. Having the slanted sides assures most of the cukes will hang below the foliage in the relatively cool shade. And remember to mulch the plants heavily and don't let them dry out – taking these plants on an unwanted roller coaster of moist and dry conditions through the summer a sure way to harvest a bumper crop of bitter cucumbers.