Bee's, is it best to let them do the work ?
I know this must sound strange, but: I have been growing a few cucumber plants, as posted on another thread, they are doing well, except for lack of female blossoms. Iv'e had hundreds of males blossoms, but no females, until this morning !!!! I have been checking each morning and have been amazed at the amount of bees around the plants, 3-5 each morning as I water. It's amazing to see them poking around the blossoms. My question is, will the bees polinate the females, or do I need to hand polinate. The females are only open for 24 hrs and I don't want to see them wilt and die un polinated. On my squash plants last year, I saw no bees, so I hand polinated and it worked well. Any input would be great, thanks.
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rainbowgardener
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Personally if you are seeing the bees, I would trust them to do their work and see what happens. If the flower gets pollinated you will start seeing baby cucumber very soon. If it doesn't work, you can always do the hand pollinating later. Now that the plant has started producing female flowers, it is likely to keep it up, so this won't be your only chance.
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gixxerific
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I agree totally. If you are seeing bees it will get done. If you watch them you will see they will hit the majority of flowers before moving on. They even leave a scent behind to tell them what flowers they have already visited. They don't miss much if there are a bunch of them then you should be good.
Cucumbers are usually something you don't need to worry about. They are usually very prolific sometimes too prolific. Squash on the other hand sometimes need some help, some of the squash variety's may only get a few fruit per plant but cukes usually can fend for themselves.
Good luck.
Side note here are they bumblebees or your typical honey bees?
I noticed more bumblebees around my cukes this year though there were the honey bees as well.
Cucumbers are usually something you don't need to worry about. They are usually very prolific sometimes too prolific. Squash on the other hand sometimes need some help, some of the squash variety's may only get a few fruit per plant but cukes usually can fend for themselves.
Good luck.
Side note here are they bumblebees or your typical honey bees?
I noticed more bumblebees around my cukes this year though there were the honey bees as well.