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Tag: Fruiting

When Do You Prune Pomegranates and Figs?

When Do You Prune Pomegranates and Figs?

“When do you prune pomegranate trees and fig trees?” Question from Renita of Flomaton, Alabama

Answer: Pomegranate (Punica granatum, USDA Hardiness Zones 8-11) and figs (Ficus carica, Zones 6-10) may both grow as trees or shrubs and have different pruning needs. Here are tips for when and how to prune them.

How to Prune Figs

Figs are deciduous further north and evergreen further south, so they need to be pruned differently depending on where they are growing. The goals when pruning a fig are to control excess branching, encourage an open habit and new growth, and control height. Fig fruits are produced on new wood in summer and a second crop, called a breba crop, is sometimes produced on the old wood later in the season. Breba figs are generally not as tasty.

Where I live in Delaware (Zone 7), my sweet ‘Celeste‘ fig’s stems may die back partially or even to the ground, so I wait to prune until I can easily scratch the stems in early spring. That way I can remove any branches that are dead. Southerners should wait to prune until the cool of late winter before new growth has begun to appear.

Start by cutting the largest stems back to the base as well as those that are overlapping and small and sucker-like. From there, you can cut the remaining stems back to 3-4 feet. Figs grow large quickly, so this process should be repeated annually if you want to encourage more compact growth. Fertilize them shortly after pruning with balanced, slow-release plant food, such as a 10-10-10. (Click here to learn more about growing figs, and click here for more detailed pruning tips.)

How to Prune Pomegranates

Like figs, pomegranate foliage can be deciduous, partially-evergreen, or evergreen, depending on how far north you live. Pomegranate fruits develop in summer on second-year growth, so care must be taken to prune them at the correct time and refrain from removing all of last year’s wood. Prune them in late winter before they flower. When pruning, the goal is to shape and thin the crown by cutting off any crossing, excessive, or overgrown stems. Each stout, main stem should have five to six lateral branches remaining. Tip growth can be cut back to maintain a uniform crown of 4 to 5 feet. A thinner, tidier crown looks good and should yield better fruit. It is also essential to remove any shoots or suckers from the base of the plant throughout the growing season. (Click here to learn more about growing pomegranates, and click here for more detailed tips on pruning and training them.)

I hope that these tips help!

Happy gardening,

Jessie Keith

Black Gold Horticulturist

How Do I Get Pomegranate Trees to Set Fruit in Florida?

“I live in Southwest Florida (Englewood, FL) to be exact. I bought 3 Pomegranate Wonderful trees and planted them about 3 years ago. They’re really not doing much of anything. They just exist. They refuse to flower, they barely have grown at all, and one just clings to life and is constantly yellow. I planted them with storebought soil at the base, and fertilize with 6-8-6. They are in almost full sun, get plenty of rain this time of year…but they just don’t do anything.” Question from Nikki of Port Charlotte, Florida

Answer: Pomegranates are Mediterranean and Middle Eastern fruits adapted to cooler winters and hot, dry summers. Florida is not their ideal climate. They need heat, dry weather, and rocky, well-drained soils. As horticulturist Maureen Gilmer wrote: “So long as the local climate is within the cold tolerance range (USDA Hardiness Zones 8-11) and summers are not humid and rainy, pomegranates should thrive. Untimely rains in the fruit’s late-summer and fall ripening season can also cause rinds to crack open prematurely, spoiling the contents.” (Click here to read the full article.) They also like a soil pH range of 5.5 to 7.2. If your soil is more acid or more alkaline, then they will struggle to get the nutrients they need, which may explain the leaf yellowing. Excess water can also cause leaf yellowing and encourage fungal disease.

Growing Pomegranates in Pots

You can create sandy, rocky mounds for your trees, but your better bet is to grow them in large pots in a sunny spot under cover from the rain. Once you can control how much water they get, water them weekly after they become established. More water is needed as trees as setting roots and during very hot times.

Choose a large pot that’s several inches larger than the tree’s root balls. We recommend planting in a well-drained potting mix. Black Gold® Natural & Organic Flower and Vegetable Soil with 1:5  ratio of soil to Black Gold Perlite for increased drainage would work well. Feed with a fertilizer formulated for citrus trees. Follow the manufacturer’s directions. (Click here to read our full article with basic potting instructions.)

As your trees grow, prune them as needed in late winter. Any long suckers or crossing branches should be removed.

We hope that these steps lead to many flowers and pomegranates!

Happy gardening,

Jessie Keith

Black Gold Horticulturist

Why Aren’t My Pumpkins Fruiting?

Why Aren’t My Pumpkins Fruiting

“How do I get my Pumpkins to get past just flowering?” Question from Marilyn of Roseburg, Oregon

Answer: I am sorry to hear that your pumpkins are not producing! There are lots of things that could keep your pumpkins from setting fruit. Let’s start with what pumpkin vines need to grow and produce fruit.

What Pumpkins Need to Fruit

  1. Full sun (8 hours per day or more)
  2. Fertile, well-drained soil
  3. Regular water
  4. Fertilization with an all-purpose vegetable fertilizer
  5. Space–Vines require plenty of space to grow and branch.
  6. Time–Check the days to harvest for your pumpkin variety. If it is 100 days or more, then it is a late producer and just needs more time.

What Keeps Pumpkins from Fruiting

  1. Lack of female flowers (see below)
  2. Lack of pollinators–Bees pollinate pumpkin flowers, which is essential for them to fruit.
  3. Excessive heat– Very hot days (above 95 degrees F) and warm nights (above 75 degrees F) can stress vines to the point where they do not fruit.
  4. Too little light–Vines lack the energy to produce fruit.
  5. Too little time–If late-producing vines are planted too late in the season, they will not have enough time to fruit.
  6. Pests and disease–There are many pests and diseases that can reduce fruit output in pumpkins. If your vines look healthy, then don’t worry about this possibility.

Pumpkin Flowers and Fruiting

All squash, pumpkins included, have two flower types–male and female. Male blooms appear first on the vines as simple yellow flowers with stamens covered in yellow pollen. Female flowers develop towards the vine tips and have little fruits at the base of the yellow flowers as well as a single, central pistil in each bloom. If your vine has both flower types, then pollination failure could be the problem. Without pollination, developing fruits just shrivel. The solution is hand-pollination. Simply use a small brush to move pollen from a newly-opened male flower to a newly-opened female flower. It’s fast, easy, and will yield pumpkins.

It is quite possible that your vines are healthy and on the verge of producing. Time may be the only factor limiting their fruiting. Many late pumpkins will not start bearing until September. Keep me posted. I would love to hear the end of your pumpkin story.

Happy gardening

Jessie Keith

Black Gold Horticulturist

 

Click here to view my top 10 list of best-tasting pumpkins and winter squash!

Why Aren’t My Cucumbers Fruiting?

Female cucumber flowers have underdeveloped baby cukes at the base while male flowers do not.

“Why are my cucumber plants not setting many cukes?  The blossoms fall off before setting.” Question from Ron of Cashmere, Washington

Answer: There are several possible reasons that your cucumbers are suffering from blossom drop before fruit set. These include pollination issues, environmental stresses, and soil nutrient problems. Let’s take a closer look at these possibilities.

Cucumber Pollination

Cucumbers are dioecious. This means that they have separate male and female flowers on the same vine. Male blooms appear first on the vines and will open and drop. A week or two after the male flowers appear, you should start to see female blossoms on the vines. These are easy to spot because they have undeveloped baby cucumbers at the base of the flowers. It could be that not many of your female flowers have appeared yet. Check to see if the flowers that have dropped have little underdeveloped fruits at the base. If not, they are male flowers and your fruiting females may just be getting started.

Once you have both male and female flowers on your vines, bees pollinate the females. If your yard has few bees, fruit set can be a problem. Look for bees, and if you don’t see any, you may have to try moving pollen from the stamens of the male flowers to the central pistil of the female flowers. This is easily done with a small brush or Q-tip. Another option is to choose a self-fertile cucumber variety, like the award-winning ‘Diva’, which does not need pollinators for fruit set.

Cucumber Plant Stresses

Healthy vines will lack spots or wilting leaves.

Seasonal temperature extremes–above 90 degrees Fahrenheit and below 60 degrees Fahrenheit–can induce flower drop and inhibit fruit set. Too little or too much water can too, though in both instances you will see overall vine decline. There are also many cucumber diseases that can inhibit plant vigor and fruit set (click here for an expansive cucumber disease list), but once again, you will see signs of poor plant health.

Cucumber Nutrient Needs

Choose a vegetable fertilizer formulated for fruiting crops for vigorous fruiting. Soil that is too high in nitrogen can inhibit flower and fruit set. Cukes also need organic-rich soil with a near-neutral pH (6 to 7) grow to their fullest (Black Gold Garden Soil is a great soil amendment).

I hope that this info will help you determine the root cause of your cucumber problems. To learn more about cucumber growing success, watch the video below.

Happy Gardening,

Jessie Keith

Black Gold Horticulturist

When Will My Lemon Tree Set Fruit?

“I have a lemon tree that’s five, or six, years old. I was wondering how old they have to be to produce fruit, and if there has to be two of them, or is cross-pollination not necessary?” Question from Royce of Texas

Answer: A lemon tree should be fruitful by five years of age. Most lemons are self-fruitful and do not require cross-pollination, but they do require bright sunlight and good care to flowering and fruiting. Has your tree begun to flower? If so, give it good care and it should begin fruiting for you. For care instructions, I recommend you read our article titled Growing Lemons, Oranges and Other Citrus Indoors (click here to view the article). It will give you all the information you need to encourage your indoor lemon to fruit.

Happy gardening!

Jessie Keith

Black Gold Horticulturist

Unproductive Pumpkins

“I’d like some info on why my pumpkin seeds didn’t produce pumpkins. There were lots of leaves and flowers, but no pumpkins. I planted them plenty early enough, and there wasn’t any frost. The leaves just started dying out by mid-September.” Question from Kimberly of Vancouver, Washington

Answer: Sorry to hear your pumpkin vines did not produce pumpkins! First, make sure that all of their growing requirements are met. Pumpkins need to be planted in spring, after the threat of frost has passed, for fall harvest. Full sun, summer warmth, and space (a 12’ x 12′ to 15 x 15’ patch) are essential for vining varieties. It pays to plant them on berms (click here to read all about berming) amended with lots of organic matter. Feed them with a fertilizer formulated for vegetables, and be sure they get plenty of moisture (probably not a problem in Vancouver).

If all their growing requirements were met, there are four more possible reasons why your pumpkins did not develop.

1. Lack of pollinators

Pumpkins have two flower types, male and female, and these are bee-pollinated. The male flowers are produced first, followed by the female blooms, which have small, underdeveloped pumpkins at the base of each flower. If you see female blooms on your plants, and no bees, this could be the problem. Without pollination, the developing fruits just shrivel and drop. If you think this is the cause of your troubles, try a hand-pollination method. Simply use a small brush to move pollen from a newly opened male flower to a newly opened female flower. It’s fast, easy, and will yield pumpkins!

2. Time

Lots of pumpkin varieties require good growing conditions for more than 100 days to produce. Early pumpkins are a good choice for those living further north. The varieties ‘Flatso‘ (85 days to harvest), ‘Chucky‘ (85 days to harvest), and ‘Cinnamon Girl‘ (85 days to harvest) are all early to produce.

3. Disease

Some fungal diseases and disorders will cause the fruit to shrivel up at various stages of development if you don’t think pollinators are your problem. (Click here to read a great article from Purdue University about pumpkin diseases and solutions.)

4. Squash Vine Borers

These pests bore into the stems of pumpkins and other squash and cause whole vines to die back because they are cut off their water. Usually, with vining pumpkins, some of the vines survive because they root along the ground and survive, so this is often less of a problem. Nonetheless, click here to read a great Q&A about squash vine borers to determine if this is your problem.

Better luck with your pumpkins next year!

Jessie Keith

Black Gold Horticulturist