Courgettes and ... male flowers!

I have two courgette plants: one Buckingham, one Green Bush.

Both are flowering ( ) but I have noticed that while Buckingham is flowering on what look like courgette but the Green Bush are flowering on thing long green stems which I think means they are male and won't produce a courgette?

So, questions:

• what can I do (if anything) to encourage the Green Bush variety to produce "female" flowers on the end of juicy courgettes?
• the Buckingham variety have courgettes, but they are teeny; how do I know when they are ok for picking?
• with male flowers, should I let them continue to do their own thing, or, like many things in nature, should they be ... culled?

Many thanks
"M" the courgette novice

 

Don't worry, @"M", your Green Bush will soon be fruiting.

In my experience (I've grown lots of different varieties over the years), they tend to do a "trial run" of male flowers, before they settle down to producing courgettes. Just leave them be, and you will soon be wondering what to do with them all!

When to pick them? Well, you can pick them as soon as they are big enough. I tend to pick when they are about 1" thick to start with, to encourage the plant to grow more. This means they are normally 4-5" or so long. I have noticed that sometimes the first ones can be a little odd, where the flower end doesn't swell as the rest of the courgette grows bigger. If this is happening, I pick it. Normally when the plants are stressed. The size that they are normally sold in the shops - 7-8" long, about 1.5-2" in diameter, is probably the optimal size for max cropping. But the baby ones are really sweet in salads, and if you let them get bigger, then it's a marrow!!

 

I have gone up to my courgettes and taken a photo, to give you an example. (I used the yellow courgette plant, as it's easier to see the different flowers, and the green courgette is just going crazy with gunnera-style leaves at the mo)
You can see the two male flowers on either side of the Felco blades, whilst the courgettes are also forming to the right. I will probably be cutting at least one courgette either tonight or tomorrow...

I never bother trying to pollinate the flowers, as they start to form the fruit without it. As you can see, the yellow fruit is forming on the lower right, even before the flower opens.

 

Dear Lord Mr @shiney such a turn of phrase!!!

Suffice to say, on that note, ... I have yet to succeed in shaking/hand pollinating a male out of the 'we want to be a boy's club' mentality. Perhaps I've just been doing it wrong But, I'll give courgettes a go ... and add it to my list of "attempts"

 

" title="WantLick " /> I'll give that a bash too

 

Ok, thank you

... ... so, has this one decided it was Bi ?

Gosh what a generous offer!!! Thank you



Nah, you're ok ... just remembered Mrs @shiney knows where to find *me* ...

Thank you (and for the photo, which was very helpful) do you add them to your salad raw? Grated? Diced? Sliced?

 

Yes, I slice them thinly, just like cucumbers, very tasty!

There was also a recipe I found last year, where you slice them diagonally, to get long strips, toss them lightly in seasoned olive oil (with crushed garlic), and cook lightly on a griddle. Seriously yumsk!!

 

I'm there with the garlic/oil/griddle!!! YUMSK indeed!

 

So, not "confused" males then?

 

I'm getting from this thread that a lot of people are picking unfertilised fruit.

I know that courgettes are just the continental way of picking immature marrows, but I always thought that they should at least be a bit bigger than the unfertilised female flower, which will rot in a couple of days if not pollinated.

 

I agree, @pete . (That's better - turned off Dutch auto-correct keyboard...!)

Within a few weeks, I will be waiting for the courgettes to be at least 6-8" long, and about 1.5" in diameter. But when the plants are young, I try to encourage them to crop by picking the fruit younger. So below is a photo of some young yellow courgettes I've picked in the past couple of days... the left-hand one is showing signs of starting to tail off, where the growing tip stops expanding, although the rest of the fruit behind is still swelling. The right-hand one would have developed normally.
The green courgettes tell another story! Remember I mentioned that the green courgette plant was turning "gunera" on me? We were checking out the veg beds yesterday evening, and I spotted something.... something rather...large!! I guess we are having a stuffed marrow some time this weekend! Next to it is a classic example of a tail-off courgette. Having removed these unlikely "twins" from the plant, I expect it to grow normal courgettes from now on. But I will be watching it .... very .... carefully!!