Newhouse Farm

[jobrok1]

Bloody pumkins keep falling off...

Loads of big flowers form and wither away.
But after a short while the bloody tiny pumkin falls off.


WTF...!!!

[KevB]

Sounds like they aren't being pollinated, to me. Try moving some pollen from flower anthers to the stigma in the middle of the flower.
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Gardening is the only unquestionably useful job. -- George Bernard Shaw

[compostwoman]

But if tiny pumpkins are forming that means they are being pollinated?

I have had that in this very damp weather, lately
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http://compostbins.blogspot.com
Environmental Educator, Forest School Leader, Master Composter, Holistic Therapist. Smallholder.

[danksshady]

I've had the same with small butternut squashes - growing to a certain small size then yellowing and dropping off
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mum to 6 - trying to be greener in our own way

[Snoopka]

I'm very ashamed to admit that I have had this not just with squashes, but also with my courgette plants lately, both the long and the round ones. I put it down to not having been able to get manure this year, and in spite of the compost, the soil is very barren. I did use some nettle juice though. With summer temperatures oscillating between min.18 and max. 38 and a very dry and hot climate, it seems ridiculous to do so badly with those plants.

[KevB]

There is a tiny pumpkin at the base of the flower when it opens. If not pollinated it will wither and drop off.
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Gardening is the only unquestionably useful job. -- George Bernard Shaw

[compostwoman]

I am talking about smallish but not tiny pumpkins..but not sure what size the OP was talking about?
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http://compostbins.blogspot.com
Environmental Educator, Forest School Leader, Master Composter, Holistic Therapist. Smallholder.

[KevB]

jobrok1 did say tiny.

With pumpkins, like cucumbers, there are male flowers for the pollen and female flowers that eventually develop the fruit.

Do yours get any larger than this?
If not they are not being pollinated.

If they do, I'd suspect inadequate watering but that's hard to understand in this wet summer. Depends where you are.
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Gardening is the only unquestionably useful job. -- George Bernard Shaw

[Mike&Penny]

Probably not successfully fertilized.

Don't know how deeply we need to go into plant sex, but the area around the ovaries often swells when receptive in preparation for being able to support the developing seeds. The developing seeds would be releasing hormones to maintian this development; none of too few seeds and the fruit aborts. No point in the plant wasting the resources of a whole fruit for just a couple seeds.
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There is no possibility of social justice on a dead planet except the equality of the grave.

[jobrok1]

I have a hard enough time trying to maintain my own sex life, let alone that of a pumpkin.

So just tell me what kind of fore-play or oral stimulation the plant needs to aid in the insemination process.

I’ll nip into the shop on the way home for a pair of marigold XL’s to to the job.

[Billy Rhomboid]

We had this last year with our courgettes. We decided it was excessive humidity.
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Carpe Cerevisi

[solar bud]

Getting it here too with my butternut squashes, although I have two pumpkins swelling very nicely.

I was wondering if the plant simply grows however many fruit it can maintain until maturity, and sheds the rest. I suppose this would depend on soil fertility, depth etc.

Just a theory though.

(or is it a hypothesis?)
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Solar Bud
http://greencottage.burysolarclub.net
http://www.solarbud.co.uk

Wine, women and song are so expensive now that I never have any money left over for luxuries . . .

[Mike&Penny]

Excessive wet weather can certainly be the factor with bee pollinated plants. Bees don't fly well in the rain and female flowers of squash family plants are receptive only for a short time period.

You can try hand pollination and it's not that hard with these large flowered plants. Use a good quality water painting brush, insert first into a male flower on another plant that is releasing pollen and then into the female flower you are trying to pollinate. Messing about with the sex life of squash is easier than with plants with small flowers containing both sexes in the same flower and which are self fertile (say you wanted to do tomatoes).

Yes most of the squashes will limit fertilizations to the normal amount of fruits so you should know what that is for what you are trying to grow. For example, butternut squash should go to four fruits per plant. If the plant is stressed for fertilizer, etc. more likely to have smaller fruits than fewer.

You could try an "necroscopy" on the fallen off fruits. Cut open and examine for the presence of fertilized seeds. These should be obvious in any squash ovary above an inch or two in diameter.
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There is no possibility of social justice on a dead planet except the equality of the grave.

[planetologist]

I had no fruits at all on my courgettes and pumpkins, so it may be a different problem, but after I gave my courgettes diluted pee they started fruiting, so I concluded it was a shortage of nitrogen and have fertilised the pumpkins as well now.

[Mike&Penny]

If a little bit of pee helped then they had way too little nitrogen! All the squashes prefer very rich soil and would be perfectly happy growing on a compost heap.
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There is no possibility of social justice on a dead planet except the equality of the grave.