23,594 Garden Web Discussions | Vegetable Gardening
As I read through the posts , it becomes obvious that you may have no fruit with ONE or more plants.
My Own Experiment:
I have grown a SINGLE tomatillo plant at times and have gotten fruits just to prove wrong the theory that you need more than one plant.
There is no male or female tomatillo plants. So say you have two of them and both produce fruits. So WHO is pollinating WHOM? It just does not make sense.
Lat year I had ONE plant and started producing lanterns late August by tens if not hundreds. But could not get bigger when the weather got cooler.
This year I am also growing just one plant again. So far ZERO lanterns. But I am waiting and I am sure it will fruit later , just like last year and twice before few years ago.
I suspect that tomatillo is day length sensitive Being the native of Mexico, they like short days, not 16 hours day that we have here. Some how, either the pollens or the ovules are not viable at certain weather condition. It has noting to do with the number of plants.
Hey, Nancyjane, I may be mistaken, but I believe that downy mildew can be pretty much avoided in our climate if you use drip irrigation. The summers are too dry for easy propagation of downy mildew. I've seen people who had what I took to be downy mildew it on plants, but they were generally spray irrigated, or ornamental plants in the winter. I am not an expert, though, so take it for what it is worth. ;-)
McKenzie
1)-The one in the picture shows (probably) Phosphorus deficiency.
2) Some pepper and tomato varieties naturally have light green foliage; like Gypsy, yellow banana. While others have darker green foliage; like Jalapeno.
3)- In general a very dark green leaves is an indication of over supply of Nitrogen. In this case they need a lot more water until the excess Nitrogen is washed down and/or used up.
If the plants are growing well and there is no signs of any disease but no blooms then likely it is available nutrient related.
In the deep south high heat can delay blooming but in zone 5 temps I'd suspect there is excess nitrogen in the soil or insufficient phosphorous. Excess N leads to big bushy, plants with few to no blooms.
So what and how much have you fed them or what have you added to the soil in the way of nutrients? And I assume these are in ground? If they are in containers then that is a whole other set of issues.
Dave
Thanks, Dave! I looked up the squash vine borer and performed surgery on three plants, removing a fat borer from each. I hope each plant has a one-borer limit, because I didn't want to try digging for more.
A fourth plant appears to be affected, but the stem at the base of the plant is so thick and short that I didn't want to cut further after the first cut, which yielded nothing. Instead, I cut off two badly affected leaf stems. Instead of white borers, I found several dark brown (or dark red) millipede-type critters inside the stems. I wonder if they're a side effect of the squash borer, or a separate problem. Any idea?
I covered all the slits with soil and am hoping for the best.
Chris - if you will check out the other 'help me ID..." posts further down the page here and over on page 2 - been a real run of the question lately - you'll find that volunteers and those grown from saved seed can seldom by identified. And even then they are just guesses.
Squash cross-pollinate far too readily (unless it is prevented) for them to breed true. So yours is a hodge-podge. :)
Growing out volunteers can be interesting but seldom worth the work or space.
Dave
Oh, thanks for the ammonia idea! I definitely have to go for deterrent since DH doesn't want to set a trap and attract more/other creatures, and capture the wrong one. How long does the ammonia last? Does it need to be refreshed every day? Bummer it's going to rain for the next 5 days so it might get diluted. I'll post back and let you know if the hoop worked.
Funny thing is it's just this 1 spot, and I haven't seen any worms at all, certainly if there were worms in the beds there would likely be more than 1 and I have 120ft of wooden-framed beds in the 65ft tunnel, plus another 60x4 ft mounded deep bed of the same compost in the middle. The compost is so old (finished) that I don't think there's anything for a worm to eat. No cutworms or grubs either (maybe next year), this manure had been covered with landscape fabric for a few years.
Because the plant is staying put and not running around, I don't think it's a decorative gourd. The texture of the rind and the leaves suggest yellow squash lineage. When the plant sets another fruit, harvest it as a summer squash and see how it tastes.
If I had your strange squash I'd let it mature taste it as a winter squash, but don't get your hopes up. In my experience, four out of five times they are dogs, but fun to grow.
When you dabble in open-pollinated cucurbits, some off types are part of the scene.
Agree with planatus. Since you planted volunteers you will likely never know its name as it probably doesn't have one. It is a result of previous cross-pollination of unknown plants. But the odds are it is edible, just not worth the space it is taking up in taste.
As all the previous "help me ID this squash" posts here show, saving squash seeds and growing volunteers very seldom turns out to be worthwhile. It cross-pollinates far too easily to faithfully reproduce from seed without active intervention early in the previous season.
Dave
I live in S.E. Ohio and we have had some 'different' weather from the usual. Lots of rain, but our rains have been interspersed with sun, and there have been a lot of just showers. My garden has been a thing of beauty this year and the biggest challenge is keeping the weeds under control, with the almost constant temperatures and high humidity. I have had issues with fulvia fulva on tomatoes and this is a first I have ever even seen it on outside plants. It's usually a greenhouse issue. They're still producing and are just starting to ripen with no damage to the fruit. Very bland taste this year, but I expected that because of the rains. So far the yields have been lower than last year's but still quite ample. Low insect pressure. The horrid winter had one good effect, I guess.
Mine do this every year when it starts to get too warm. I spray with water to wash all the aphids off, then spray with a mixture of neem/peppermint castille soap and water.
I do this every 5-7 days and if it needs a water spray in-between, go ahead.
The sprays you mention don't cure powdery mildew (well I'm not sure about the daconil and immunox). They only help to control it's spread. Which is what you've noticed. If you didn't spray the PM would have most likely taken over your plants and quickly. Once you've got PM there is no turning back the clock.
Rodney
Well, I have read elsewhere that PM rarely kills an entire plant by itself or effects new leaves, and this seems to match my experience. I did not spray every plant I have out there and some others have gotten it on a few leaves but it is spreading slowly, only on the older leaves, the same as the pumpkins. I did not spray the newer leaves either. While I understand that PM can't be cured, I honestly don't feel like I have made any real significant difference, only perhaps slowed it down a tiny bit. Given that all of these plants are now on their way out no matter what I do, I am kind of burnt out from trying to take care of them, and will be happy with the harvest I am getting. At this point 2 zucchini a day, about 10-15 acorns, 4 butternuts, 8-10 pumpkins (assuming they all mature, but I bet I can eat them green all the same, or use them for dog treats), I am already sick of squash now and haven't even harvested all the winter stuff yet.
What would be good for prophylaxis next year?
This post was edited by Peter1142 on Mon, Aug 4, 14 at 9:52