I have observed this on one of my jack be little pumpkin vines. You can see where the fruit is and then when the flower dies, it looks like it is going to make it but after a few days it just shrivels up and then falls off. I am assuming that it didn't have enough male pollen to guide it into its direction of growing lol. Sorry for the lack of terms.

I am having this same problem. The pumpkin will get to be the size of a pea with the flower still attached. Even before the flower opens it turns yellow, and shrivels up. It has been hot here. In the 90's during the day and then in the 60's at night. I mulched around the plants with grass clippings. All the male flowers are doing great though, blooming really big.

gosh! this is so anoying! why cant anyone help? im having the smae problem! ive had probably 500 male blossoms open and close. BUT ive had about 100 female blossoms and EVERY SINGLE ONE turns yellow and shrivels before it blooms! does anyone know how to save them?

It is normal for some of the female flowers to yellow and fall off before they open. I suspect you are all in one of two cases. Case one is before any pumpkin is formed the female flowers fail to open or case two you have a pumpkin and the rest of the female flowers fail to open.

Case 1: Pumpkin plants need to be about 2 months old before they can start setting fruit. It has been my experience that they are ~10 feet long when they get their first pumpkins. The tiny jack-be-little vines can be much smaller when they start forming pumpkins, their behavior is more like an ornamental gourd than a traditional pumpkin.

Case 2: After a flower opens and is succussfully pollinated the rest of the female flowers will fail to open because you already have a pumpkin, the vine can't support more than the one at this time. With my pumpkin vines I had a pumpkin get pollinated on 7/1/07 and that particular vine did not have a second female flower open until yesterday (7/28/07), almost a full month.

For me there are many more female flowers that never open than the ones that do open. This is just because the pumpkin plant can't support a pumpkin for whatever reason, it is not any disease or serious problem. That being said if your female flowers are opening and you don't get any pumpkins that can be an actual problem other than poor pollination.

If this doesn't answer all of your questions please let me know.

Thanks so much for the information weirdtrev. Exactly what i needed to hear with my first year growing a pumpkin.

Weirdtrev, thanks for the information. I am trying to get some mini pumpkins and ornamental gourds this year, but I'm not certain I will get a fruit the rate I'm going now. I am having a similar issue with my blossoms at the base of the plant and with my leaves (mostly) at the base of the plant turning brown and shriveling up. The top of the vine looks pretty healthy.

Also, not exactly sure if I have a female blossoms (thought I had lots of female since there's a tiny bump at base, but inside looks male to me) Time will tell.

I now have pumpkins beginning to grow one week ago my neighbour pointed out a huge wasps nest in my hedge they were taking all the pollen for their hive and since I got rid of them/it and started pollenating I now have pumkins... I hope

Hi all!!

I'm new to growing gourds, and while I know this is a pumpkin thread, I have been looking for an answer to why my luffa vine's female flower's start out appearing healthy and happy, but soon turn yellow and never full mature. I'm wondering if the same explanation might apply to this branch of the gourd family as well. I've had some healthy female flowers, 7 to be exact, on a vine that is easily 30 feet long (with all of its branch offs). I'm very mindful of the females because I'm told that one healthy vine can support up to 30 good sized loofah (luffa) gourds.

I currently have 5 growing, and I believe a 6th was successfully pollinated by hand as were the previous 5. I contacted the site owner of luffa.info and he suggested I might have a fungus issue, or the water here in West Palm isn't all that great, but I can't find a definitive answer, and this is the only vine I have and I was hoping for a healthy crop of loofahs for gifts, but unless I figure out the reason for poorly maturing females...there's no way I'm gonna see even half that amount.

Do you think it could simply be a matter of the vine needing to grow more in order to support more fruits? I only ask because while it's still branching, the rapid growth I saw over the last few months has slowed dramatically, and the vine may be close to, or has already reached it's maximum size. As best I can tell the vine is very healthy, and has been lightly fertilized, and I was hoping someone that's an experienced gourd grower, if not loofah, might be willing to help a newbie gardener.

Any thoughts or possibly pointing me in the right direction if this is the wrong area in the forum to be inquiring about loofahs, would be greatly appreciated!!

Thanks!

40Acres

this is my second time planting pumkin, there where lots of males and female flowers but the problem is they turn yellow before its open...