Chicken bald back

[Leicester_H]

Dear all,

 

I don't know the correct terms for many things, so please bear with me.

 

I have some cucumber, squash and courgette plants.

They seem to have formed flowers (some leading to obvious 'fruits') near junctions of main stem with shoot.

There seem to me 2, 3 or 4 veg forming very close to each other at each junction.

I was considering removing all but the strongest veg at each junction to give them the chance to form freely - is this sensible ? I assume one plant can't support 'millions' of veg forming ?? Or do I just leave them to get on with it !?

 

I await your invaluable advice, H

[sjp]

courgettes tend to develop quickly so you thin them out as you pick them courgettes you use small anyway. cucumbers depending on the variety can support a fair few fruits but do self regulate how many they let develop but the older varieties have a nasty habit of dropping fruitlets if you leave one to grow to big, the short cucumber types are the main ones that do this White wonder Marketmore and Bushbury's Blonde to name 3

Squashes /Pumpkins really depends on 2 factors one is were they originate from i.e. the med' region or the Americas . and the 2nd if how big you want them and how well you feed them

if your growing Hundred weight or American Giant or any of the bigger types then you only leave one fruit on. but something like turks turban , Vegetable sphagetties or the French or Italian named ones they'll form 2 or 3 good sized fruits the pattie pans, snake heads and the small fruited varieties tend to grow like courgettes, the pattie pans, snake heads are really courgettes anyway

I have remove fruit from a pumpkin once when I was trying to grow a big one but it back fired on me the fruit that I left died off and no more female flowers were produced so now I leave them to it

[Leicester_H]

Thanks sjp - that's really helpful.

H