pollination of cukes

[Warren]

how are cucumbers pollinationed?

[feldon30]

Bees or other pollinating insects (even Little Black Ants can do some) must transfer pollen from the male flower to the female flower. The female flower has an ovary (a small cucumber) behind it. On some varieties, it can be difficult to tell the female from the male.



Because of Bee Colony Collapse Disorder that is going on right now, you may need to pollinate by hand. You can try a Q-tip, or you can try carefully removing the petals (but retaining the pollen-bearing parts) from a male flower and then transferring the pollen to the female flower.

[duajones]

I had great success hand pollinating my first plants of the year which were Poona Kheera. I have tried a small artists paint brush and removing the petals from the male and inserting into the female with the latter giving me the better results. Not a big deal if you have the time but a pain once you get real busy with the rest of your garden.

[FlipTX]

Some of them don't need to be pollinated at all. Parthenocarpic cukes like Diva and Cool Breeze set fruit without being pollinated. I think other things like temperatures/daylength/etc help trigger fruitset.

[DeanRIowa]

How do you was a Q-tip in pollinating?

Do you swab the male and then just swab the female?

Dean

[shelleybean]

Dean, I have not tried it with cukes but that's how I've done it with squash. Pretty much just the way you've described it. It works best early in the morning when the flowers first open.