There seems to be several threads about this issue I posted one myself called pumpkins miscarriaging , well yesterday my neighbour flagged me down and showed me a wasp nest the size of a human head and since there has been multitudes of wasps in the garden (which I assumed were just eating aphids) I later put two and two together wasps steal pollen from every plant they can for their nest . Its something you can look into I've been pollinating the three plants myself for a few days and have yet to see if that will make the difference at least now the nest is gone .

Thanks -- I found your question after my posting and saw a reference to the directions for hand pollination and plan on trying that.

I have same problem no pumpkins on my plants I havent found wasp nest but have seen some flying around house, but also not seeing any bees. How do i self pollinate and when is best time to do so please.

This link has directions for self pollination.

http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/gourds/msg0611545713356.html

I'm growing pumpkins for the first time this year as well and I learned very quickly that pumpkins do not like heat ! We had a very hot and humid start to the summer so the female flowers were turning brown and dying before the flowers could get big enough to open. Add to that a raging case of powdery mildew because of the humidity and my superior watering from overhead skills (in the evening no less), well, you can imagine. But once it cooled off, I started seeing alot of female flowers and began keeping track of them. You can tell when they're about to open because the flower gets tall and light yellow and there will be a small, maybe a little bigger than a grape tomato, green baby pumpkin underneath it. Both flowers usually open in the morning and just to be sure I have been going out there and hand pollinating them myself. Now I have 5 pollinated pumpkins in various stages of growth and another 10-15 little female plants (one of which will open tomorrow). I've been marking them with little colored flags so that I can find them easily to check on them. Make sure they are mostly covered by the pumpkin leaves and protected from direct sunlight until they are pollinated. Once they are, they grow like crazy. In terms of water, they can't seem to get enough. I also brew tea and use that as well (all of my plants seem to respond to tea, I think it's the tanins). Make sure to water the root area only though or you could end up with the powdery mildew (white spots on the leaves) problem I had. If you do, there are plenty of commercial fungicides and most of them are pesticides and insecticides too. OK, that seemed alot shorter in my head. Sorry for rambling so long. If I had known I was going to go on that long I would have brought water. Good luck with your pumpkins !

I have a question about my ornamental gourds. Good news.....I finally got some baby gourds. Bad news....the vine is dying and the gourds shriveling up. I have one vine left. I'm so sad that I may not get anything at all. What is going on?

Chris