\nBack in my post from August 1<\/a> I speculate, with some backup, one reason male flowers might precede female ones on pumpkin plants. Yet, there is another possible reason.<\/p>\n \nPumpkins are known to have grown in Central and South America thousands of years ago. It seems logical to assume that, in those places, the growing season may not have ended; rather, new pumpkin plants may have sprouted constantly. In that case, it didn’t matter which flowers came “first” on the same plant, because there would have been other pumpkin plants nearby at different stages of development. Therefore, the males on a given plant could have been used to pollinate females on local plants a few weeks older. In turn, by the time a plant began producing female flowers, a nearby plant a few weeks younger would be producing males, and so on.<\/p>\n \nIn fact, the separate timing of male and female flowers would have been advantageous in that a given plant would be less likely to self-pollinate.<\/p>\n www.gov.nl.ca<\/a><\/p>\nJack of Oracle Tutoring by Jack and Diane,<\/a> Campbell River, BC.\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Self-tutoring about gardening: the tutor mentions a possible theory about why male flowers develop first on pumpkin plants. Back in my post from August 1 I speculate, with some backup, one reason male flowers might precede female ones on pumpkin …<\/p>\n