Grow Your Own Magazine

A couple of months ago I planted some courgette seeds in pots. About a month ago I transferred 2 plants into a grow bag as they were overgrowing the pot. I kept the other couple of plants in their pots, in case anything should happen to the bagged ones (slugs etc!), but I haven't really been attending to them (they're too big for the pots now, and the compost has dried out on a number of occasions). The plants in the bags are doing well, in that they're growing loads of new stems but I have not yet noticed any flowers. In contrast, one of the ones in a pot has produced a huge flower (I didn't know they were going to be that big!), that looks like it may have a proto-courgette behind it (though I don't exactly know what I'm looking for, and obviously I haven't got any male flowers in the vicinity!).

Anyway, I was wondering whether this is coincidence or whether stressed plants are more likely to flower first. If so, is her anything I can do to encourage my bagged ones to get on with it?

TIA

Chris

Hello DRF, you're right about plants in small pots coming into flower first. That's why the advice on growing tomatoes says leave them in their small pots until the first truss of flowers starts to appear before moving them into their final growing pots. You could put your flowering courgette into a bigger pot now. I would be careful not to plant it deeper than it is at the moment as the stems are inclined to rot if you do. As for your courgettes in growbags, well just be patient. They will do it.

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From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.

My 2 smallest pots of aubergines are the first to flower too. I'm getting more compost next week so they will soon be potted on. I believe they feel they might be at death's door and want to reproduce before they get pulled through. I don't think the produce will be so good if you leave them there though. You get a similar effect if you have a plant or shrub in the garden that should be flowering but doesn't if you dig it up, take it for a walk to the compost heap, tell it that it's going there if it doesn't buck up, then drop it back in its hole again. Stress - you have to be cruel to be cruel!

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Earth laughs in flowers. Ralph Waldo Emerson

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Updated November 17th - The Big Dig

Most plants fruit with stress, as Flum says to continue their genes before death. There are many useful applications including root trimming and tying down branches with fruit trees. You can also use a timer and bin bag to convince plants that it past midsummer and fruit early. As I see it, in the case of toms or aubergines etc.The trouble with the water stress theory is once the fruit starts to swell they take on a lot of water and need to have a strong system to do it. Irregular watering causes much disease. It is also why you wait until the flowering starts to up the potassium levels. First the plant then the fruit.

Whilst it always amuses me that the best tasting tom of the summer is often, the tough skinned thing from the plant that was chucked out the back of the greenhouse,, or has sprung from the path, I want consistent quality and yield over a long season rather than one swan song early fruit from a disheveled plant

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Paul