Garden Problems and Solutions

Have you ever felt the disappointment of a garden failure? You take a bite out of a delicious looking strawberry but there wasn’t any flavor, or you go to water the garden and see black misshapen fruits and veggies, or maybe there just aren’t many fruits and vegetables there? These situations are discouraging. They leave you wondering what went wrong?, and how to fix it? Those are the questions we will answer in this post. The four subjects for this post are:

There aren’t any blossoms on my plants (quantity issue)
There are blossoms but no fruits and veggies (quanitity issue)
Ugly fruits and vegetables (quality issue)
Flavorless Fruits and vegetables (quality issue)

Because there are numerous factors at play in the garden, we’ll also include some of our resources for troubleshooting garden problems.

Nutritional composition of the soil. Too little or too much of a nutrient causes problems with plants producing blossoms. For example too much nitrogen in the soil can lead to ample foliage but little to no blossoms. To get your soil tested:

Contact a university or garden center near you for details.
Purchase a garden test kit like this one and DIY it.
Guess based off the natural indicators for soil testing. Such as the weeds and plants growing in the soil and the health/symptoms of the plants there. You can find some more details here.

A lack of nutrients, particularly nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium, may delay flowering. Stick with a balanced, low-analysis fertilizer, such as 12-12-12 or 6-10-4, to apply adequate nutrition without overdoing.

Pollination. A blossom without pollination will eventually just shrivel and die. On some plants, like squash, the squash will be aborted if it does not receive the proper pollination (pictured above). Most pollination is done by insects. Do you see bees, butterflies, and other insects buzzing around the blossoms? If you aren’t seeing them flying around there is a good chance they aren’t there. Insecticides and urbanization have wiped out a lot of our pollinators. Learn more about that here. Pollination is required for plants to turn blossoms into fruits. To learn more about pollination check out this post. If you find that there aren’t bees buzzing around, you can put up your own bee house and buy bees to start your own nest. If it’s too late in the year (August) to get your bee house going you can try hand or device pollination.

Freeze Damage. Depending on how developed the blossom is freezing temperatures may cause a lot of damage or not very much. The blossom in the bud stage, or closed stage, is able to withstand colder temperatures than an open bud. If the trees experience warm temperatures leading to bud maturity and blossoming and then are exposed to cold temperatures there is a good chance the blossoms will be killed. Here is a chart depicting the kill rate based on temperature and maturity for pears and apples. Here is a link to a chart for stone fruit. It may not be preventable and it definitely isn’t favorable to lose blossoms to cold temperatures but it does solve the question, “where’s my harvest?”. If you experienced frost problems you can check out this post to evaluate the viability of the blossoms and determine where pruning can help.

Depending on the timing of the frost a blossom may be killed, or damaged. The damaged blossom may lead to deformed fruits and vegetables. Frost damaged fruits and vegetables can vary in appearance but will usually have some darker pigmented areas. In strawberries they will have black spots, apples, peaches and pears can have brown scarred peals.

A late frost, after the fruit is fully developed will also cause damage. Damage done after the fruit is developed is known as chill injury or low- temperature breakdown. If chill injury occurs the interior of the fruit can be brown and change texture. For more info. click here.

Pollination. Fruits and vegetables can be partially pollinated. Every seed of the fruit must be pollinated in order to have uniform growth. In partially pollinated fruits one part of the plant (the side that was pollinated) will grow correctly and another part (the un-pollinated section) will be stunted; Leaving a lop-sided fruit or vegetable. Apples and pears will be smaller on one side than the other. If you were to cut them in half you would find a seed formed in one side but not the other. Strawberries will have small, immature seeds in at least one area of the fruit (do not confuse this with black areas from frost damage). Cucumbers will usually have a taper at the end that some times is curled/bent.

*Pollinator tip- Plant your varieties far enough apart to avoid over crowding. Planting a short crop with small flowers like cucumbers next to a large plant (like a squash plant) may be problematic. Pollinators will focus on the easily visible blossoms rather than pollinate both crops equally.

Fungi. There are numerous species of fungi. Fungi are spread through spores on fruit trees and other plants. Apple scab is a common infection that can winter over in dead leaves. It is particularly problematic in areas with high humidity that allows the fungi to thrive. If you suspect fungi is the culprit behind your garden trouble try pruning excess foliage to allow more sunlight and better air flow. It is best to get a handle on fungal infections early because it can easily spread and kill an entire tree or orchard if left unchecked. For more information on apple scab and other fruit tree infections click here. For information on spinach and other “greens” infections click here and here.

The birds and insects might find your fruit too good to pass up. There might be holes or peck marks marring some of the fruit. watch out for earwigs inside stone fruits. Though they may be annoying we recommend letting the birds and bugs have a few of the fruits. Leaving the chemicals off is better for you and the native pollinators. After all, there should be plenty left over for you if you’ve had good pollination. Here’s more info. on what pests to watch out for during the later part of the growing season in Utah. Here is a study on bird management in orchards.