Pinetown resident hand-pollinates her butternuts, now that’s dedication
Nature lover and avid gardener from Ashley, Natalie Rowles hand-pollinates her veggies for assured results.
NATURE lover, environmentalist and Ashley resident, Natalie Rowles, has been taking photos of the insects in her garden and encourages readers to do the same and to share them with the Highway Mail (email to michelled@dbn.caxton.co.za).
She has kept busy during the lockdown taking photos of insects in her garden, cooking up a storm using her home-grown produce and tending to her many plants, veggies and herbs.
This week, she shares how she hand-pollinated her butternut flowers.
“I am now playing the role of the Love Goddess in the Pumpkin Patch!
“With the lack of bees for pollination in my backyard, I am forced to play this role to hand-pollinate my patch of butternuts under the Macadamia nut tree,” explained Natalie.
“The female flower will open with a green baby butternut just underneath the big yellow flower and if not pollinated early in the morning by a bee, it will close its flower by folding it up into a ball-shape, then the following day it will fall off the stem, due to lack of being pollinated.
“Female flowers are few and found in-between the mostly male flowers in the pumpkin patch, so to ensure that I do get a good crop of butternuts, I am forced to do it by hand.
ALSO READ: Capture the creepy-crawlies on camera
“I will pick a male flower and then de-petal the flower and take the male organ out and smear the pollen all over the female part which looks like a human’s ‘fist’. Then I insert the male organ into the middle of the female part to ensure a 100 per cent success rate,” she said.
“I try and close the petals to ensure success in this process. This action you have to carry out very early in the morning as the female flower only opens for a very short duration then closes again, so you only have a once-off chance for success.
“So far I’ve had eight butternuts from a butternut plant – the most to date,” Natalie said proudly.
The plant, which she has fondly named, Lady Lazarus, was at a point of dying, but with her special fertilizer she managed to resurrect it.
“Now Lady Lazarus is back growing flowers and very big with dark green leaves, like she is a teenager again!
“I even used it on my Peru purple and red potatoes too, and got a whole lot of real baby potato plants from the seeds of the potato flowering plants.”
ALSO READ: Natalie Rowle’s cow-pea pancake recipe
“I am doing another female flower who was treated above and the baby butternut has doubled in size every day. To ensure that no insect will sting my precious baby, I’ve covered her baby in 40 per cent shade-net and placed the baby on top of a tile and expect, in about two weeks’ time, to harvest the butternut, looking like one of the eight I’ve harvested so far from the plant.”
Purple Peru potatoes.Natalie urged the community and especially children to take up gardening.
She said watching plants grow and creating new species of vegetables is incredibly rewarding
Caxton Local Media Covid-19 reporting
Dear reader,
As your local news provider, we have the duty of keeping you factually informed on Covid-19 developments. As you may have noticed, mis- and disinformation (also known as “fake news”) is circulating online. Caxton Local Media is determined to filter through the masses of information doing the rounds and to separate truth from untruth in order to keep you adequately informed. Local newsrooms follow a strict pre-publication fact-checking protocol. A national task team has been established to assist in bringing you credible news reports on Covid-19.
Readers with any comments or queries may contact National Group Editor Irma Green (irma@caxton.co.za) or Legal Adviser Helene Eloff (helene@caxton.co.za).
Do you want to receive alerts regarding this and other Highway community news via Telegram? Send us a Telegram message (not an SMS) with your name and surname (ONLY) to 060 532 5409.
You can also join the conversation on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
PLEASE NOTE: If you have signed up for our news alerts you need to save the Telegram number as a contact to your phone, otherwise you will not receive our alerts.
Sorry, no large mg for the bee which has been identified by Dr Leslie Mertz as the East African lowland Honey Bee – Apis melifera scuttellata which is a sub-species of the ordinary honey bee that I don’t have here in my garden! It is so difficult to photograph bees as they are very fast flyers, so if you can do something with this photograph I will appreciate it.
“Morning Glory” liquid = my fresh early morning urine mixed with cold water = best liquid fertilizer created by Mother Nature to date!
Just in case the other photos didn’t made the grade, here are new photos I took of the bee, baby butternut which have been pollinated by myself three days ago! (You cannot believe the excellent nutrients in my morning glory liquid fertilizer to produce so quickly a baby butternut in only 3 days’ time!!) I’ve used no other fertilizer or compost at all – so the poor can feed themselves using my methods of growing food anywhere even in tubs etc.
As well as the Peru red Potatoes as mentioned.
