The Sex life of Plants

This is my climbing courgette 'Black Forest' I have t be pretty regular with tieing the stem up a trellis every couple of days but it has been quite prolific, and by far the best so far. It is 5 foot tall and still climbing now. My sweet corn is going great guns... now down to the sex part... at the top of the corn stalk is the flowering part. From this falls the male pollen...

This male pollen is blown by the wind, hopefully downwards until it reaches....

The female parts.. her silky bits are just showing from the top of the growing corn cob. The male pollen has to fertilise the female silks, then at the end of each silk will grow a lovely sweet corn kernel. This is why sweetcorn must be grown in blocks together and not in rows. A block of sweet corn will enable all the female cobs to be fertilised in an orgy of pollen.

The photo above is a male pumpkin flower. His pollen will have to reach....

The female pumpkin flower.. it usually does! Some times if you are growing crops indoors or you want to be sure of good pollination you can artificially pollinate a female flower with a male flower. This one is my lovely 'Rouge vif D'Etamps' pumpkin. This is what my blogging friend Hx called 'pimping my pumpkins'