My zukes are developing small fruit,,,,two to three inches long and then they begin to wither from the blossom end.
Water is fine, no bugs, plants are healthy and stems are fine.
I suppose this is a pollination problem, as in I have seen no pollinatiors in the garden? Am I going to have to give each of them a hand pollination? Ideas? Help!
This sucks bigtime.
Charlie
A fine short bristle artist brush. Start by fanning inside the large male blooms and then the blooms on the end of the fruit. Also works on squash, tomatoes, etc. Next thing you know, your neighbors will not answer the doorbell!! ;-)
Been there - done that
Tom J
If they're making fruit, they're pollinated.
Go to google and search using the words "zucchini blossom end rot". I believe this will answer your question.
Like so many things we don't miss em till they are gone. Notice the idea of fallow or grass strips left to their own nearby our gardens.
Bill
Maybe all you have is female plants. Chances are better to have both sexes if you have more than 6 plants. Mine are producing like crazy this year.
The male/female difference will be on the blossoms not the plants...the female flower will have the small fruit behind the flower bud.
Lar
I was not aware there can be both sexes on a single (zucchini) plant. I'll take a look tomorrow.
Another thought... I found that borage (the "bee plant") draws bees to the garden for higher yields. It doesn't hurt to plant a few flowers here and there to draw pollinators.
Yeah. They're sort of like David Bowie from one year to the next.
heh heh....I'm going to get some kind of bad rep over this situation, eh?
Thanks.......the Lovely offered me the use of a brush she has.
Charlie
Sounds like the problem I had last year. Fruit would develop to the size of my little finger and then start browning from the bloom end. At the time I had no pollinators either. I started hand pollination by taking the male flowers, which are on the long stem, and doing pretty much as you might expect with the females flowers, which are down on the branches of the cucurbit. Sorry Charlie, no pictures. Fortunately for me, the bees showed up shortly there after and they took over.
You have a choice: harvest zucchini the day after the flower has opened and then pollination is immaterial, or pollinate by transferring pollen from the male onto the female flower.
The "Blackjack" zucchini that we grow here in Australia can grow up to about 6" before its flower opens, and that's a perfect size to pick a tasty mouth-watering fruit, so pollination is moot.
Please don't boast about your six inches, and how tasty it is, and how it leads to a flower opening. And how pollination is moot, when you only put it in your mouth.
This is a family-friendly newsgroup. Thank you.
I've been doing the hand pollination thing, though a few bees ahve appeared and have taken over partially.
The variety we planted, Costata Romanesco, are about three inches before pollination, and now that they are growing, we have started to harvest some of the tiny ones for salads and the like.
I looked up your Blackjack and it sounds like it is quite prolific.
Thanks
Charlie
This is not necessarilly true.
Actually zucchini fruit can fail to set properly due to soil condions
*and/or* lack of pollination... there are also other inderterminate conditions such as disease and certain insect infestation. I've experienced the same condition, with kirby cucumbers. This condition is more likely to occur with particular hybrid varieties. I've learned to plant at least two, often three varieties of most vegetable plants wherever practical. I plant from seed but I also buy plants in flats; whenever possible I buy from more than one nursery... this as insurance against a totally failed crop. Sometimes a nursery may have mutated or diseased plants. Also buy seed from reputable sources, avoid bargain seed packets from companies whose name you don't recognize. I try to stay with Burpee seeds... I often buy end of season packets when they go on sale for less than half price, sometimes 10cents a pack. I've never experienced any noticable loss of germination from older seed, I have packets of seeds I've been using for more than ten years... so long as seeds are properly stored they can last indefinitely.Read to bottom and then click on pollination link:
Yo, Bro.
Same thing happened to me last year. The zuch would gett ot he size of my little finger, discolorize at the flowering end, and then fall off. The group held my hand while I started hand pollinating. I started hand pollinating because there was a conspicuous abscence of pollinators around at the time. (I suspected the ol' biddies across the street had gone wild with Sevin on their ornamentals.) Shortly there after the bees arrived and the zuch and the crookneck took over one end of my garden.
Do you have: New leaves that don't unfold Tip of young leaves looked scorched Growing tips die back General lack of plant vigor
Sandy soil Salty Soil High rainfall or heavy irrigation High level of aluminum in soil
If the answers, as I suspect to all these are no, keep pollinating by hand until the bees arrive. Should only be a couple of weeks.
I mean, this soil has worked for you before. Calcium doesn't easily get washed away. There is a lack of pollinators and these puppies need to be pollinated.
If you have heavy clay, add some well decomposed compost and keep soil slightly moist.
Heat wave broke here. Should be in the low 90s today. "Bird house" gourd has 2" to go to reach the top of the trellis. EVERYTHING grew at least an inch yesterday. Odd, because everything was wilting by late afternoon watering.
Going to look at a news article about a camera man who was shot by the IDF after he was already down from being shot previously.
Israeli Settlements Exceed Boundaries, Report Says
Maj. Avital Leibovich, an army spokeswoman, said today that many times Hamas takes militants with them and gives them cameras, like this person, who is not in our perspective a regular journalist, but a militant like the others. She said he wore no vest identifying him as a journalist, and that at other times, such cameramen have also been armed and used their weapons. She said that in the gunfire, it was not clear who shot Mr. Ghanem in the legs.
The International Federation of Journalists today condemned the shooting. This is a vicious and brutal example of deliberate targeting of a journalist, said Aidan White, the groups general-secretary. The Israeli authorities must investigate this case and bring to justice those responsible. Mr. White added: This man was carrying a camera, not a gun. He was no threat to Israeli forces.
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someone may be dancing with glee, but it's not Imad Ghanem.
Where you been? Take all this time to get the cork outta yer breakfast? Too much fun last night, I suspect.
No more sex in the garden for me....the bees arrived, see post to Maddie, somewhere further along the line.
I haven't checked much news for several weeks, so I did today......damn boy....it's been hot out west!! Hope it moderates really soon, more than likely will in several millenia, eh?
You old fart, this is sad and bad, but I am not going down today......maybe tomorrow.
Charlie
Yeah....I've had nothing but fantastic results from Burpee over the years. For some reason, they're the company that some people love to hate. But, I don't care. I get one chance at a garden each year. Agway's bean seeds have been near perfect, too, even the ones I've had for 5-6 years.
Well, at least the plug got pulled on our local heatwave. Nature is very civilized here. We'll get scorchers for a couple of days and then the fog comes up the river and chills everything out. At least that's the way it usually works.
The "bird house" vine is 1" from the top of the trellis now even though the temp has dropped back to 78 F from the 100+ F that we had yesterday.
My Mac OS 9 has given me an identity crisis. Hopefully I was able to whack some sense into it.
Oops, sorry.......OS problems take the good humor out of one...when in the midst of some hardware or system eff-up, I'm best left alone.
G'luck Charlie
Diskwarrior
Bill
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