GardenBanter.co.uk - View Single Post

05-04-2003, 06:34 AM

(Perksy) writes:
I have a couple of plants of watermelon and I am about to plant a
rockmelon. The watermelon has had a few flowers, but no fruit - and I
have never had much luck getting a lot of fruit out of these. I was
wondering if there was some sort of trick to getting them to fruit. I
live west of Brisbane - near Ipswich

Perhaps the problem is bees? Or more precisely, a lack of bees?
You might have to buy a tiny artists brush and start pollinating the
female flowers with pollen from the male flowers. It's a bit fiddly
because they are small. Alternatively, you could consider buying a hive
of native bees to do the job for you. They are stingless and so tiny
that your neighbours won't object because they won't notice them.
--
John Savage (for email, replace "ks" with "k" and delete "n")