2014 Pumpkin Patch Thread

Old Man Bakke said:

Subscribing to this thread. Currently battling powdery mildew. Trying some baking powder water mixture but have some daconil fungacide one hand if I need to use it. Do you folks use seeds out of your pumpkins to use for planting the following year? If so how to store them and hat varieties are mildew and mold resistant?

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I've saved seed, but I don't RELY on saving seeds, as saving seed is like a box of chocolates, you never know what blah blah. It can be fun, and if you've only planted one variety (and no neighbors have any squash plants) you can have a good bet at getting the same thing next year, if you plant more than one variety...well, it's always fun seeing what pops up.

I just scoop out my seeds, and put them on a paper towel and set them aside till spring, but I have a set of shelves where they can sit undisturbed. You'll also want to save A LOT. I saved a hundred or so, and only about a dozen germinated.

As for powdery mildew resistance...I'd have to look into what varieties are naturally resistant, they are few and far between. Some seed places offer seeds in generic or "powdery mildew resistant" varieties. The resistant seeds in these cases have a bacterial coating that is known to inhibit mildew (and in some cases bugs too). The idea is this becomes part of the plant, thus the plant becomes resistant. This is similar to some techniques used in some kinds of GM corn, and comes with all the same controversy, so depends on your point of view on what it means for you.

For me, we tend to eat a few of the pumpkins so I shy away from any seed treatments myself.

Powdery mildew seems like the only problem I haven't had so far. I've got one vine that seems to have exploded overnight (it's wrapped in a muslin bandage, seems to be not actively dying), one that the borers got to that doesn't look so hot (doesn't want to go on the cart just yet, but not feeling happy), and the squash bugs have appeared (hello, Seven my friend, I'm glad these aren't for eating). Seem to have lost a pumpkin where the stem has broken. But, I've also got quite a few good pumpkins going - they seem to be turning orange early, but are still growing (keep on little maxes!) one in particular which is nicely shaped and getting large that I've got sitting upright. Probably about 1 good baby pumpkin per (healthy) plant. Seems like maybe they're not setting as many as fast as they ought to be doing, so I feel a little behind even though it's only just August. Thinking I should break out the Miracle Grow - I haven't done any fertilizing so far (good dirt, things grown here rarely need much help).

And that's my rambling update, since I haven't provided any in a while. Hopefully I'll remember to take the camera out for pictures soon.



(Relevant: I have cornstalks drying and waiting for their final purpose. They have that dry cornstalk smell. Very motivating.)

Well, I'm in a losing battle with the mildew here, so it's all down hill from here.

So, the peak of the garden, the sugars have overtaken the additional trellising I built up. There's a jack be little mixed in with them somehow as well.



The whole sunflower circle just never really worked. In spots we got 6' tall sunflowers and in other spots things are just too sparse to make an impact. I tried to transplant some from the 'entrance' and 'exit' to the sparse area, but they didn't take.



Here's a neon, with my son's name etched in, basketball size, ready to harvest. We have at least 4 of these, likely more in the corn. I double checked while taking these pics, and neons have practically NO pricklies along the vine, no wonder they didn't deter anything from the corn...ah well, live and learn.


This is the ones I saved from the wolf. They are very uniform in size and shape, like a nerf football. They fit in perfect with our neons and sugars for making nice smaller carvers for the younger kids at the party.



Our corn buffet for whatever's eating it.



Our mystery pumpkins are all getting a similar shape as they grow, and looks like they'll be nice and orange. They range from about twice the size of a JBL:



To something equivalent to a large sugar.



The mildew taking over the sugars.



Speaking of the sugars, we have about 10. looks like a couple are softball sized, they'll be set aside to make into cookies. Most are that perfect size I like to grow for the wee little ones to carve.