Growing Squashes and Sweetcorn

[watervole]

We've been experimenting and learning for several years with both squashes and sweetcorn.  Last year, we had loads of male flowers on the squashes and very few female, and the sweetcorn were devoid of flavour.

This year, both were massively better - and  we were growing the same varieties.

Here's how to do it.

Start your plants off in a small pot indoors or in a greenhouse.

When they're five or six inches high, plant them out.

Dig a hole with a spade.  Put a shovel's worth of manure in the hole.  Put the soil back on top - and make a rim to hold water (i.e. a circle about a foot across).  Plant one squash, or 3 sweetcorn (near the edge of your circle) on top of the soil on top of the manure.

Water.  Keep watering.  If the weather is dry - water.  Do not forget the watering.  If you aren't sure - water.

If you can add urine to the water, even better.  (for new readers to this journal, dilute urine - about a litre of urine to one watering can - is a perfect liquid feed.  It has an ideal NPK ratio, is sterile when fresh, can be carried easily in plastic milk bottles, and is free.)

If you water, you will finally get those female flowers on the squashes, and your sweetcorn will set properly and taste fantastic.

Also, when the shoots of the squashes are getting too long, pinch out the tips.  You want them to put energy into the fruits, not into growing more leaves.

These are both greedy plants.  Feed and water them properly, and they will reward you with delicious food.

Comments

[raspberryfool.livejournal.com]

Indeed, i noticed a couple of female flowers on my butternut plants a coupe of weeks ago. Last year's two butternut fruits tasted great. Thanks for the tip; I'll pinch out the growing tips forthwith. :-)

You can eat the unwanted male flowers; some folk deep fry them.