Hi guys,

Can I just confirm that the images are showing young squashes being "aborted" naturally by the plants and not because of any diseases? The morning I found them they are no longer attached and seems to be detached naturally from the stem.

To my understanding, the plants will only yield squashes when certain criteria is met such as high temperature on the day of pollination, not enough pollen extg.



Thank you very much!

I've seen it before...
As to cause...

Dunno, did you dissect?
Might be a SVB caterpiller inside... They usually don't cause the blooms to drop off, but sometimes happens.

I wouldn't worry, if vine is otherwise healthy.
Shame that you didn't post pic of the vine those came from.

And...
Is it raining there? Enough? Too much?

stone said:I've seen it before...
As to cause...

Dunno, did you dissect?
Might be a SVB caterpiller inside... They usually don't cause the blooms to drop off, but sometimes happens.

I wouldn't worry, if vine is otherwise healthy.
Shame that you didn't post pic of the vine those came from.

And...
Is it raining there? Enough? Too much?

There's no caterpillar, vines look fine. I think the plant just decide to abort probably due to issue with pollination

Squash vine borers don't, to my knowledge at least, affect butternut or other C. moschata squash, due to the fact that they have a solid stem rather than the hollow stems that C. Pepo and C. maxima have.

I agree that they are probably just early squash that didn't get pollinated.

I am wondering if your entire garden is suffering from a calcium deficiency. Its time to figure out why the calcium in your soil is not available to your plants. I recommend a soil test.

Weedwhacker said:Squash vine borers don't, to my knowledge at least, affect butternut or other C. moschata squash, due to the fact that they have a solid stem rather than the hollow stems that C. Pepo and C. maxima have.

They happily lay eggs on the blooms and fruit... At my house....
Thought I was going to outsmart them by planting solid stem varieties... Didn't work.

if you inspect the hollow stem types, you'll find that SVB often go for fruit and blooms as an easier path than just the stem.

These fruits seem fallen off BEFORE the flower even opened,..ruling out pollination? implying some other stress?

Might have rained, or watered too much... Or hit by drought.
Still no pictures of vine.

stone said:

They happily lay eggs on the blooms and fruit... At my house....
Thought I was going to outsmart them by planting solid stem varieties... Didn't work.

if you inspect the hollow stem types, you'll find that SVB often go for fruit and blooms as an easier path than just the stem.

Stone, thank you for that information -- I've only just recently (past 2 years) started having problems with SVBs, so my knowledge on the subject is limited. To date they haven't seemed to attack the flowers or fruits on my plants, but they have killed some of them by infesting the stems.

Thank you guys ,
unfortunately I was unable to get a picture of the vine. But they seemed fine.

For the past weeks, I've been dealing with a disease affecting the leaves but not fruit which is a headache because I can't find any similar symptom online.
The most likely reason would be due to stress. If anyone has come across this issue before, please help let me know

More photo