2010 Pumpkin Garden
Our 2010 pumpkin garden
I have, for several years now, tried to grow pumpkins in my vegetable gardens. Until last year, success had not visited my patch. Small gardens of too few plants, under-watering, and a lack of knowledge the likely culprits in much of my failures. Last year, my success was limited to 4 grapefruit sized (or slightly larger) pie pumpkins that, due to a late planting, never turned orange. Incomplete pumpkins, but pumpkins nonetheless.
This year, I decided to do things a bit differently. I remembered from several years back that some of my best pumpkin plants had emerged from the remains of an un-carved pumpkin left to rot over the winter. Those plants grew at an amazing rate and, had they been allowed to keep growing, they would have likely fostered my first successful pumpkins. Sadly, the pumpkin that was left to rot over the winter, was left in my mother’s flower garden. I did transplant a few of those plants, but they failed me thereafter. my assumption, both then and now, is that the meat and guts from the pumpkin fed the plants. So this year, I put that theory to the test. I saved all of the remains from the 15 pumpkins that we carved last Halloween. Shortly after Halloween, I tilled the meat into the soil, spread the guts and seeds around in a 4′ x 8′ section in my garden, covered it all with straw, and just let them be. Winter came and went, and in the spring several dozen plants emerged.
If you look closely, you can see one of the pumpkins up against the chain-link fence near the top.
This year, I’ve also learned that the way I’ve been watering my pumpkins in past years has been all wrong. Allowing the leaves to get wet during watering encourages this type of leaf mold that these plants are very susceptible to. With that in mind, I wet out and bought a soaker hose, which seems to be working out quite well.
It is now nearing the end of June, and I have my first pumpkins on the vines. 2 so far, each about the size of a baseball, with several more female flowers about ready to open. While this is by no means indicative of success, it is a promising start.
Plans are now in the works to increase our gardens real estate. My wife and I have decided to expand our garden by several hundred square feet. In fact, we will be increasing the size of our garden by nearly 200%, from the current 182 sq feet to a total of 544 sq feet. Now I’ll have room for more pumpkins, and maybe a small crop of corn. SWEET!
With that said, I wish all of you home pumpkin growers great success!
One of our first pumpkins for the 2010 growing season.
2 Responses “2010 Pumpkin Garden”
Congratulations on your pumpkins! It sounds and looks like they are off to an excellent start. And, I’m definitely going to use your tip on tilling the pumpkin guts right into the soil this year. I want to turn the soil over in November, adding my haunt’s leaves to the mix, my compost pile’s goodies, and now the pumpkin guts, too.
Thanks for the tips and hints, SK! And I wish you all the best with your pumpkin patch. The Great Pumpkin will be very good to you this year.
Thanks John, and you’re very welcome for the tips. Sounds like you and I are both headed along the same path. We, as well, are planning on increasing the size of are garden this year, and are also doing our own composting. With any luck, the Great Pumpkin will be good to the both of us for many years to come.
It’s good to hear from you again, thanks for visiting.