North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["Bob Hartman" <hartmansfruit@msn.com>]

Our zucchini started out with all female flowers for the first 10 days to 2 
weeks or so before the male flowers showed up.  But that was way back at the 
beginning of the summer.
Bob
Western Washington

-----Original Message----- 
From: Road's End Farm
Sent: Sunday, September 11, 2011 6:09 PM
To: North American Fruit Explorers
Subject: Re: [NAFEX] OT - Zuchinni pollenation

How long ago did you seed them? What variety did you use? How long
have they been flowering?

As Ernest said, male-only flowers are normal at the start of flowering
for cucurbits; but female flowers should be along within a week or two
from the beginning of flowering. It's possible that you have a variety
not suited for your area in some fashion. I don't know, offhand, what
would cause male-only flowers to continue so late in the season,
unless you started the plants quite late and they haven't been
flowering long.

By the way, most varieties of tomatoes, eggplant, and beans don't need
insect pollination; and there are a few varieties of cucumbers which
don't either, though most cucumbers do.

Yes, you can definitely eat squash blossoms. May as well get something
out of them!


-- Rivka; Finger Lakes NY, Zone 5 mostly
Fresh-market organic produce, small scale



On Sep 11, 2011, at 5:50 PM, Caren Kirk wrote:

>  Rivka and Ernest,
>
> OK now I'm a bit better informed, I went to check the flowers and
> they're all male! How does that work? This is commercial seed I'm
> using!
>
> Is there something that causes the plant only to set male flowers?
>
> Feeling terribly zucchini-deprived but searching for recipes for
> blossoms,
>
> Caren.


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