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Rhubarb Floribunda
josusa47
Posts: 3,530
in Fruit & veg
Two of my rhubarb crowns give me yummy big sticks aplenty, but the third one is hellbent on flowering. I've cut out at least four flower stems this season. Is there any treatment which will curb its fecundity and make it do the job I pay it for?
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Water, water and still more water.
If that doesn't do it then ditch it and get another crown.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Thanks, I'll try watering more. But they're all in the same patch so the good ones get no more water than the Floribunda.
Sometimes you get a crown that just cant help trying to flower ...did it put up a flower spike last year as well? If so, I'd ditch it.
You could try having a really firm word with it first ....
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Dove, I will certainly issue a stern warning, it worked for my dear old dad. He planted a passion flower, in three years it had covered a large expanse of house wall but not flowered. "If it doesn't flower this year," he said, within earshot of the plant, "I'm cutting it down and planting something else." It flowered every year after that.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
I've had a similar thing with a damson tree.
my old tree (here when I moved in about 15 years ago) has produced very little fruit for the last three years.
I didn't give it a talking to, but decided to buy a new young tree. I thought I'd hang on to the old one until the new one started to produce fruit.
it has had an amazing effect - my old tree is absolutely dripping with fruit this year. It's as if it's saying "there's life in the old dog yet". I certainly won't be getting rid of it now!
I daresay a pollinator was all it needed to set fruit.