. Bulletin of the Department of Agriculture. Agriculture; Agriculture. THE MELON" ELY. 13 ment that this type of injury causes is readily apparent. Such prun- ing back of the vines, repeated over and again, may prevent the formation of sufficient growth for the development of fruits. INJURY TO THE BLOOM. Although injury to the seedling plant and to the growing stem is greatest in watermelon and can- taloupe and is of little importance among squashes, cucumbers, and pumpkins, the injury to the bloom is very serious among all these crops except that of the cu- cumber. Among pumpkins an
. Bulletin of the Department of Agriculture. Agriculture; Agriculture. THE MELON" ELY. 13 ment that this type of injury causes is readily apparent. Such prun- ing back of the vines, repeated over and again, may prevent the formation of sufficient growth for the development of fruits. INJURY TO THE BLOOM. Although injury to the seedling plant and to the growing stem is greatest in watermelon and can- taloupe and is of little importance among squashes, cucumbers, and pumpkins, the injury to the bloom is very serious among all these crops except that of the cu- cumber. Among pumpkins and squashes both the male and fe- male blooms are affected; but among the watermelons, canta- loupes, chayotes, and Chinese marrows the male or staminate bloom escapes attack. It is not uncommon to examine luxuri- antly growing fields of squashes and pumpkins during the warm months and not find a single un- affected bloom. Uninformed growers often question why their vines set no fruits. The condi- tion of the blooms illustrated in figures 11 to 14 is the answer. The unfertilized ovaries of all cucurbit blooms are especially attractive to female melon flies. The flies lay eggs in the undevel- oped and unfertilized ovaries of the bloom before the blossom un- folds, and the larvae, on hatch- ing, often so ruin the ovaries, as indicated by their burrows shown in figure 12, that the flower never unfolds. In those varieties having long, narrow fruits the ovaries are many times so eaten out and decayed that the weight of the upper part of the bud causes the ovary to break (see fig. 13). So complete is the destruction. Fig. 12.—Work of melon-fly larvae in bring ing about destruction of ovaries of pumpkin bloom even before the corolla has entirely Please note that these images are extracted from scanned page images that may have been digitally enhanced for readability - coloration and appearance of these illustrations may not perfectly resemble the original United Sta
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