Pumpkin Growers BlogAugust 7, 2008
Pruning. Such a weird concept. I never thought that you would need to chop a plant up in order to make it grow. Kind of seems counter-productive. Well, this is what the Pumpkin Nook authors do recommend. Pruning the vines of the pumpkin plant to a short size so that less nutrients go to growing vines and more go to makeing female flowers and pumpkins. Very well.
Acutally I do see the need now. I looked over my plants and I found that vines are growing here, there and everywhere. Over top of one another. So I started chopping this morning. I chopped off a vines that actaully had female buds on them... which was painful. But then, I've seen enough female buds not do anything, so chances are that the way they were growing, they wouldn't have made it anyways.
I saw a female flower open and ready... so I decided to hand pollenate it. I found another one while poking around, so I pollenated that one two. The first one was close to the fence nearest the house, the other one was toward the back.
I got yet another "SURPRISE". Another pumpkin has formed! Not sure why I didn't see it sooner. But it is there. It is pretty close to Jessica so maybe I was too busy snapping shots of her to notice the new one. I'm calling this one "surprise" because she was one.
Jessica and Nancy are growing well with all of this rain we've had. Jess is about 6 inches in diameter and 5 inches long. Nancy is slightly bigger.
The Leader is still vining but no signs of fruit.
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