Squash Humor in Paradise

This one’s for Noelle. And Michael. And Ben.

I have been trying to pollinate my yellow squash for days now. The task is harder than it sounds, even for an Idaho farm girl. But I’m determined, because just as our garden was starting to look fabulous, and ready to burst with edible delectables, the squash started to shrivel, and that damn gopher found our corn. Two stalks have fallen, and the zucchini plant went from ill to cadaver in an eerie stretch of hours between dusk and dawn. But the yellow squash and pumpkin plant are far from the gopher’s haunt, so I think I have a chance with them, if I can figure out the pollination. I guess some more explanation is in order.


I got a new job. I feed horses, drive big trucks, and remind people not park on the rocks by the river (even if the parking lot was full and they had a lot of beer to carry and it made them tired). With my new job came a general realization in the office that I might be qualified for other prospective jobs in the future that had seemed a bit, well, out of my skill set to various co-workers (they didn’t know about my past life with A.I. training since they hadn’t read my March 20 blog post). All this to say, I got my rental contract extended, and my family gets to stay in Paradise. Yay! Among other things, we celebrated with various purchases, one of these being satellite hi-speed (relatively) internet.


How does this relate to squash pollination? Hold your mouses now. We’re getting there.


I had been told that over-watering could cause squash shriveling. So I let things dry out while my family took a 4-day vacation to the Phoenix area to be with relatives. I came back to plants that looked as if they’d taken a road trip through Nevada without air conditioning (believe me, I know first hand what this does to one’s looks). They had survived my absence—just barely. And yet, after all that sobering up, more squashes than ever looked like child toes just out of the bathtub. Since I studied a bit of investigative journalism in college, I decided it was time to put myself on a serious investigation of the problem. Thus, I went inside, changed into my pajamas, and sat down at the computer to google “squashes”.


Lo and behold! Within 20 minutes I had found enough reports of similar shrivelings to feel confident in my need to assist nature in one of her most intimate acts of procreation: pollen transfer.


So we have come to the part you have all been waiting for, when I began to discuss the birds and the bees of my recent endeavor. I’ve already talked enough about birds in past posts, (If you have been following my blog at all, you know we have a plethora of them here). But bees... not so much. Wasps yes, biting flies, affirmative, black widows, numerous, but good old-fashioned bee in your bonnet, bee in your pants, diligent busy specimens, I do not have. Or I have not seen. So the pollen that in a perfect world would get passed from “male” pollen flowers to “female” fruit bearing beauties is just accumulating listlessly. Poor male blooms. I suppose their perfect world scenario would enable them to move…


Now to part of the story where you begin to question whether I actually am a farm girl from Idaho, or just someone with a vivid imagination who takes large artistic liberty.


I can’t figure out how to get the pollen from one place to the other. I have dug up a small paintbrush from my art supplies, as was suggested, but when I catch the male blooms showing off, I find the female ones closed up tight. And vice versa. And on the cucumber plants—saw some shrivels there too so I thought I’d be proactive-- I can’t tell the difference between the pollen bearers and the pollen receivers (even when I run inside to compare them to the color images on my monitor). So I am a bit of a reproductive failure, with my poor timing, and my gender confusion.


What can I do? I resort to my tried and true backup for all of life’s failures: prayerful listening. I’m trying to become more attentive to the rhythms of the squash plant. Rather than expecting it to participate in my success plan, I’m trying to learn what it can teach me. There must be a reason for all the opening and closing of flowerheads, and just because google can’t enlighten me, it doesn’t mean I can’t find enlightenment.


Enough deepness. This is supposed to make your gut ache. So I’ll end by saying that I’m not giving up on my attempt to play the role of squash birth coach, but I’m turning it over to the ultimate mid-wife, the great God creator. I’m asking for bees, please, to come and do what I seem so incapable of. Not wasps, but those creatures who can see through even the best cross-dressing routine without batting an eyelid. And, before that damn gopher finds out he has missed the best feast this side of Paradise (Road, of course), I am hoping for fat bottomed men who will buzz in and take charge of my squash problem.


Unless, of course, you have other suggestions…?