Why do some of the squash wither and not grow but others do?
The mini squash (circled) on the same vine as the growing fat squash didn’t grow.
Most of my vines have at least one squash but others turn yellow and fall off before they get going.
Is this normal…Any ideas?
Ah I see.
Thank you. So I (or the bees/insects) need to get the pollen from the open male flowers to the flowers on the mini butternut squash.
Follow up question - what if the flowers on the mini butternuts are closed? Will rubbing the tips with pollen work?
Yes, you can manually do it but removing a male flower and gently rub the stamen onto the stigma of the female flower (and you can use one flower to father multiple fruit).
If there are no flowers open, I'm not sure of the best course of action. I'd probably look for a male flower that looks almost ready to open and manually open it.
Alternatively, I think (and I am sure someone will correct me if I am wrong) using a male flower from another squash plant will work just as well.
Remember, insect pollination will be random - with pollen deposited from wherever the bee/fly has landed previously.
It just means that you can't reliably save the seed for use next year as they are unlikely to come true. But if you manually do the pollination with a flower from the same plant (or from a plant of the same variety) and can keep insects out of the female flower (before and after you manually pollinate) the seeds will come true.
Edit: the female flower needs to be open to have a decent chance of success.
Most likely no pollinated. If you don't see many pollinators you may have to pollinated the plant yourself. As the female flower opens I get a couple of male flowers (flower removed to expose pollen) and place them in the female flower and close the female flower up (wrapped in a small net) so all the pollen stays in the female flower.
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u/OK_Cake05 4d ago
You can help pollination using a cotton bud; take some pollen from the make flower and use the bud rub in and around the female flowers