The female flowers don't typically drop. They tend to remain stuck at the end of the unpollinated squash.

The males drop cleanly of their own accord within hours after they open -- often by mid-morning.

So, if you do have females (with baby squash already present), and you also have males, you should be the bee -- use a small paint brush to tickle the powdery peg of the male, then spread that pollen on the end of the female's sticky peg.

hi jean001

thank you for your kind post.

Yes, I am a bee ;) Every morning.

problem is female flower AND baby squash attached to it dries up into yellow and not even flower.Or sometimes flower but baby squash below the flower clearly is dying. So I don't get to do the beeing.

Doesn't seems like blossom end rot. Maybe it 's too hot? Maybe I fed too much?

Are you checking VERY first thing in the morning?

I find that the flowers sometimes are only open for an hour or two some days, and you have to catch them in the morning.

I had this problem last year, and every day I'd get home from work, and the flowers wouldn't be open, so I couldn't hand pollinate - and they would just drop off and die like you state.

Then i started going down before work around 6:30 AM - and sure enough they were wide open! Hand polinated those first ones, and I didn't have another instance of no polination all summer.

Just a thought!

weirdtrev

thank you! That's very informative.
I was coming to the conclusion I fed too much nitrogen. The vines grows sooo well but flower "abort" as you preciously described. Japanese call them "tsuruboke" or too much vegetable growth no fruit.

I believe I harvested only one fruit from this plant. Every flower after that is aborted - most of them I just left it on the bush.

I will cut all aborted fruit off to see if this helps. And/or let it not fruit for a while

Okay its my first time out with this squash in 10inch pots thing. Anyhow had flowers and they all opened and bloomed and then shriveled and died. Half plant with flowers half now with dead stems. I hate to sound like an idiot but as a little kid I grew up on a farm so could someone please refresh my now aged memory on what to do about this. All the Grandfolks are dead now and the rest live in the city, haven't a clue. I live on top of Witney Mountain in the heart of the woods so believe me when I say we have plenty of bees. I have four potted plants only one pot is the problem child. Does anyone have a clue?

First, I want to thank everyone on this forum that has been helping me out with every little problem I've had! You've all been very helpful. As a first time gardener, your advice (and that which I could find in searches) has been amazingly accurate.

I'm having a similar problem to that of the original poster. My female flowers and fruit are now dying and dropping off BEFORE opening. I have a butternut squash vine (two, actually) with 4 growing squashed between the two of them. I hand-pollinated these in the early mornings and they took. Since then, though, all other female flowers are dying off. Is there anything I can do to get more of them to flower and grow? I'd like to get more squash, but this is a winter squash vine and it'll take a while for the 4 growing fruit to mature and ripen.

Thanks!

The picture I'm attaching has an early female flower at the top left. The other three are in various stages of dying off. I check early in the morning and frequently look in on my garden during the day as well. None of them even opened.

Thanks for looking.

Here is a link that might be useful: {{gwi:71612}}

Haplo,

It sounds as if you may have the issue that WeirdTrev described, where your plants are not yet big enough to support more fruits than they are currently growing. If that is the case, then as the plants get bigger, you should get some more viable female blossoms.

Also, and this is a question more for the experts to answer, could it be a short period of excessive heat (which we had in our area of zone 7) or irregular moisture - potential caused by the hot dry period, that may be stressing the plants and causing the blossom drop? What do you think Trev?

Actually come to think of it, my butternut squash plant set two fruits quite easily, and then the next two female flowers have aborted. I assumed it was as Trev mentioned, the plant has to get bigger before it will support new fruit. I'll worry if it goes on for a week or two more.

Did you say that you have squash in 10" pots?

They may not have the resources available in those little pots to grow fruit well.

Personally, I wouldn't put a squash into anything smaller than a half barrel. They are heavy feeders and need a lot of water too.

If I understand correctly. See photos please.

The pink arrow denotes a baby squash whose end is starting to rot. I should discard it.

On the 2nd photo...

#1 denotes a healthy female flower. Wait to see if it gets pollinated or do it myself in the morning when it's open.

#2 denotes another baby squash whose flower has rotted along with end of zuke. I should discard it.

#3 denotes a healthy female flower with her ovary. Wait to see if flower drops off and it develops into a fruit. Pollinate with a paint brush it to be sure.

IN TERMS OF THE MALE FLOWER DOES IT OPEN LIKE THE FEMALE ONES DO EVERY MORNING? MUST I PRY OPEN PETALS AND OPEN IT MYSELF WITH MY PAINT BRUSH TIP?

{{gwi:71618}}

{{gwi:71620}}

I'm glad this question was asked as I was about to ask the same. Most of my squash are just starting production and each plant is only supporting one squash at a time and aborting the rest. I was thinking it's because the plants are young. I'm hoping as they get older, they will be able to produce more at one time. They are in 18 gallon pots.

Ania

I was having the same problem with LOTS of males and the few females I had dying off before they got bigger than an inch or two.

I too am growing in containers.

On the advice of a friend, I gave them a nice drink of worm tea-- 1 part worm castings, 3 parts H2O, steep 12-24hrs, strain and pour onto plants. I actually ended up sprinkling the left-over worm tea solids around the plant too.

Within days, I had my first viable female with healthy fruit attahced. I hand-polinated her, just to be sure.

Did the same for my straight-neck yellow and they are doing even BETTER than the zux.

Hope this helps!

(And in the meantine, Google "squash blossom recipes." Lots of yummy ways to use those tasty boy blooms while you wait for the ladies to catch up!)

Marial, I am a 1st year gardener, but the flower #1 looks like my flowers that have already bloomed. Like it bloomed this morning and it should have been pollinated this morning.

I have been waiting for the moment when the flowers open to pollinate them. The female flowers open nice and wide but WHY dont the male flowers open at the same time? Do they need viagara?

When I have zucchini that didn't get pollinated and are shrivelling up and dying, should I be cutting them off the plant? What about all the stalks from where the male flowers dropped off? How about the leaves that turn yellow and brown? (This is my first garden)

Hello,

I have the same story. Big, beautiful plants. Female flowers not opening with baby zucchini shriveling up. Has the "plant not big enough yet to support fruit" theory held up for any of you? (My plants are huge...) I also planted with bone meal when I put the seedlings in the ground. I'm thinking the above average temperatures? (SE NY)

Thank you!

I had the same problem when we had the big east coast heat wave last week.
This is the first time since May that I haven't had a zuchini a night to eat for dinner.
Now that the weather is closer to normal-though still in the 90's the female flowers look like they are healthy and will grow enough to open and be polinated.

I have also had this same problem with my Musquee de Provence squash.

It seems it cannot be only that the plant is not big enough to support the fruit or that the plant is not big enough to support multiple fruit, since female flowers have turned yellow and died prior to opening even when there are no other fruit and when plant is very large. Several flowers have also turned yellow and died within a few days of being pollinated.

I have had this problem every year i have grown Musquee, about 3 years. I don't remember this ever happening with the butternut squash i used to grow. I have been thinking of growing butternut again, since i had less problems with it, the plants were not so huge and it matures sooner.

I agree. My plants are enormous! I think it must be the heat... Hopefully things will improve.

This is just personal experience, although I seem to recall others reporting the same thing.

When a young squash is only starting to produce females, it is still quite frail to produce viable fruit. If your largest leaves are only about 6" long, the plant is too young to support the fruit even if the weather is right and you have both male and female flowers. It's as though the plant hasn't had its first period and so it can't get preggers even if there has been major reproductive action (like yellow and black striped bees or buff-coloured bees).

My first half dozen females all aborted. The flowers dried out, dropped and the baby zuke shriveled up and rotted. I, too, was alarmed by this the first time, but so far, this has been my experience with all four zukes I've had, and they all ended up producing.

The information on plants not being able to support multiple fruit is valuable. I think zukes often start out looking like there is a production problem when there really isn't. It's one of those plants that takes a little patience. It's good to ask questions, but if you have squash that isn't behaving as you expected, it is best to give it some time. As long as the squash doesn't have any funky symptoms, like discoloration of leaves, spots and blotches or funky weird bugs on leaves or close to the main stem near the ground, patience is usually the best medicine.

Second thought...

Most of you have been reporting above average temperatures. This is also my case at the moment, with 90% humidity to top it off (and my zukes seem shy as compared to a month ago).

Could it be that climate change is messing with our zukes? Will we have to kiss zukes good-bye by the end of the decade? Just wondering...

I have no idea if this thread is still alive... I am a roof top gardener in Manhattan... I would love for this site to be a resource for me as I am full of questions and few answers. Regarding my squash-- same issue as original post. Finally figured out the whole hand pollinating and am doing that-- though frequently I go out early a.m. and there are lots of boys and no girls. And yes, many of the girls are shriveling when tiny and before they get even close to opening and ready to be pollinated. I do have some maturing fruit-- it isn't quite ready to pick-- so perhaps the point about the plant not being able to sustain multiple fruit is the cause... I will keep watching. But please let me know if this thread/chat is still active. Thanks!

Well, the thread wasn't active, but the forum is...

It's not uncommon for male and female flowers to be out of sync. Most of us plant a number of vines in one planting hole/hill so the odds increase. Even then, with close to 15 plants this year, I went 3 days at the beginning of flowering with only females and no male flowers. Then, after a while, the trend will reverse. Lots of males, few females. I grow a variety known for less production per plant, so putting in a number of plants works out fine. I'm averaging 2/day right now... which is plenty.

It is got to be a heat, female flowers yellowing and wilting before opening on summer squash,but plant has one hefty fruit it set while before heat wave , may be shade cloth can help if it is in direct sin light ,just for few hours in the hottest time of the day ,vine itself extremely healthy and growing 6 inches a day

so heat and too much N. thanks alot for all this.

why are my buds drying and falling off?

2 so far. In other photo see they look healthy.

So many people don't understand that it's not a pollination issue when the flowers are still tiny and shrivel and fall off. In that case, the flower was not mature enough to open, much less be pollinated. Everyone on the internet goes straight to pollination. But if they listen carefully, many of us are saying the issue is WAY BEFORE the flower is mature enough to open.