Monday, July 9, 2012
Patch update
It seems as if the transplant went well enough. The plants seem to be growing great. as you can see, "Little Jack" the scarecrow is all but consumed. Still having trouble deciding if they should have more water or less. About two weeks ago I had about 12 female flowers with promising little pumpkins on them, but only one survived so far. most of them seemed to yellow and shrivel up before flowering. Not sure what is causing that,, again, it could be the water issue. It sure is not pollination since I have hundreds of bees on the plants every morning. All in all, these are the largest and heartiest plants I have ever grown, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed and there is still a lot of growing time left. Any advice is always welcome...my thumb is far from green.
On another note, now that the 4th of July is in the books, it's time to start prop building for this year. Trying to keep things more organized and plan things out better this year. All ideas are going down on paper first!
Make sure you add some garden lime to your soil for calcium for your pumpkins! It helps them to form those great thick skins.
ReplyDeleteAnd I always hand-pollinated my pumpkins; that seemed to work pretty well. I just had a hard time keeping them cool enough during the day since the temps around here get up over 110 degrees in the summer...
I think you have a green thumb, because those plants look really healthy! Your "Little Jack" scarecrow must have done the trick. I see him kind of peeking out. :) You should have at least a few great pumpkins by Halloween!
ReplyDeleteYour plants look great!
ReplyDeleteMine are so small compared to yours, I'm jealous!:)
It's been gawd-awful hot here which I'm sure isn't helping.
I'll be watching to see what you get!
Thanks for the tip Shell, I will definitely give that a try with the lime. I try to hand pollinate when I can, but this year for some reason the bees are crazy...thier actually "in" all the flowers!
ReplyDeleteJustine, I think you are right- it is all because of Little Jack. Although one of the vines now has wrapped around him. Don't know where he will end up at the end of the season.
Thanks Ron! don't get discouraged, your plants may just take off one day and grow tons. That's what mine did. It has been pretty darn hot here as well- numerous days in the 100"s. That makes it tough on us all. Just keep watering and like Shellhawk said,, hand pollinate if you can!
Great Patch you have growing there.... Wish you a happy Harvest...
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