The Pumpkin growing and carving challenge 2015

Too wet this morning to get some photo's, but I have finally managed to pollinate a female on one of my plants at around 16ft on the main vine, males where from the next plant so I will have a crossed seed at the end of the season.

The next plant along has a female tied up and should be pollinated in the next day or so.

Steve...

 

The pumkins from the female flowers that opened whislt I was away a couple of weeks ago are still less than 3" diameter and I not sure if they will continue to grow. My third plant has 2 female flowers at 15 and 16 feet along the main stem that I expect will open late this week, but that doesn't give them much growing time.

P.S. Was driving along a farm track Sunday and noticed a whole field of (Halloween?) pumpkin plants, each only about 4 - 5 feet across, with no sign of any flowers whatsoever.

 

I think I already know the answer to this but I'm going to ask anyway, just incase...
Would the pumpkins I have growing madly in the garden survive being replanted at the allotment?
No signs of fruit yet but lots of male flowers

 

There is loads of time left yet Scrungee, this time last year I had not polinated any fruit at all, it was roughly the 8th or 9th for the first. They then started growing at a phanomenal rate..if I recall correctly roughly 8lb per day at one stage.

Here's a post of mine showing mine starting off growing from August 12th last year, my biggest last year was over 300lb. So plenty of time yet Scrungee.


http://gardenerscorner.co.uk/forum/...d-carving-challenge.56785/page-12#post-838696

Steve...

(8lbs a day pumpkin growth for approx. 90 days gives a pumpkin of 720lbs)

 

Canny,

I very much doubt it due to its fine roots. Your plant will completely fill the area to right below the soil surface with millions of fine white roots, that is what is supporting your plants now. At the end of the season trowel back a little soil to see for yourself what they are like. They also smell of melon too.

Steve...

 

Thanks @Steve R Collapsing the frame is the best way forward then.
My garden is all paved - will the plants be ok on concrete or should I have them lying on something else too?

 

Hi Canny,

Always best to have them on soil if possible, see this post to see the root that will grow from every node on the plant http://gardenerscorner.co.uk/forum/...rving-challenge-2015.88334/page-7#post-957105

But if it has to go across concrete, so be it. Now you can see why we give them so much space to spread out. For the record I give each of my plants 20ft x 16ft to grow in, but you can get away with half of that if you wish. On a pumpkin site I visit they have a 150sq foot competition where the aim is to grow the biggest pumpkin you can in 150sq foot, so that could be 10ft x 15ft. You can train vines where you want them to go and trim back those you do not want or need.

See this post about pumpkin plant growth and pruning http://gardenerscorner.co.uk/forum/...rving-challenge-2015.88334/page-3#post-931998

Canny, do you have the bug yet? Will you be growing a giant on your allotment next year?

Steve...

 

Wow thank you for the info & the links @Steve R Very informative!
I'm think gro bags on the ground could be a way forward when I drop the frame? I have to get it done today - there are vines everywhere with no suport so theyre just hanging. This involves re arranging everything thats out in the veggie prt of the garden

Oh yes - I definitely have the bug. Next question being - what are the best seeds to use to try grow giants?

 

"Atlantic giants" are the seed most used these days, you can buy a pack relatively cheaply but many of us use proven seed, that is, seed with a history.

Example:

Tim may grow a 1000lb pumpkin and Heather may grow a 1200lb. Fred gets hold of a seed from each pumpkin and now grows a "Tim1000" and "Heather1200" plants.

Fred can now cross these two plants by taking a male flower from one and pollinating the female of the other, and grow that fruit on to produce lets say a 950lb pumpkin and make the seed from that one available to other growers and it will be named or known like this.

Grower name weight year (Mother x Father) so
Fred 950 15 (Heather 1200 14 x Tim 1000 14)

This is now a genetic line and growers cross and cross again seed this way to try and grab the charachteristics of certain pumpkins to grow their own.

But these "named" seed are what many of us grow here and there are sites out there that keep track of seeds relations from the past. These seeds in general will grow bigger pumpkins but the cheap packet of Atlantic giant seeds will grow big ones too up to around 100lb, however if you want a real giant or a chance of one, you have to go for the specialist genetic seed.

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You could put grow bags under the nodes if you have some spare but I would not go out and specially buy some now, just let this season run its course now.

Steve...

 

Definitely next year, but think I'll stick with the Atlantic Giant. Will have a look. Thanks

I'm just dismantling the frame & came across this...female? If so, what do I do with her?

 

My biggest Pumpkin

I still reckon that's a Gourd, possibly winter squash Cucurbita mixta, not a Pumpkin Cucurbita pepo and will grow into something like this



Perhaps the variety 'Green Striped Cushaw' which have flowers like this



Although the leaves look more like Cucurbita moschata, another winter squash, but the young fruits look a bit wrong for that.

 

That pumpkin is fab

As for the gourd - still something I've never grown before so will go in the book of 'firsts'
No clue where it came from though as I definitely didn't plant any & have never heard of them until you mentioned them a while back

 

I'll feel slightly confident when it's bigger than a football as they can have a nasty habit of failing whilst still small.

 

I have two fruits on my plant, however mine are yellow! Is this normal?

 

It looks normal @Scrungee 's pumpkin in the post at the top of this page is yellow too.