I do have a fruit set, but I don't think it's on track to be very big, though; it's only 21" in circumference on day 11. Apart from that, my plant seems healthy and the vines are still growing fast. I will have to make my main vine do a U turn as it has reached the edge of the growing area; I didn't realize the plant would get so big when I planted it! I'll soon start terminating secondaries, and possibly the main later on, I can't make up my mind on that.

Revilo,
My 615 lber. last year had a 16.5" circumference at day 10. You may be surprised at how these things can grow. I look forward to your day 20 measurement.

Regards,
Douglas

My God, mine's 12 feet long and growing about 6 inches a day. I've already pollenated 2 female flowers. It's growing like a weed ! Maybe I started it too early. The baby pumpkins aren't really growing yet though. I pollenated them about 5-6 days ago and they're a little smaller than a tennis ball. They're kinda close to the crown of the plant too, one is about 7 feet out and the other maybe 8.5 feet.

I just hope that I can control the climate around the plant when the heat wave hits us -- it regularly goes over 100 here in the summer. I've already noticed some heat stress on days when it is 85 -- the leaves are all droopy. I've added some irrigation to help but maybe that's not enough -- we'll see.

I will trade a progress report for some advice.
I planted an Atlantic Giant in May. It is growing well. Perhaps 8 feet of length on the main wandering vine.
Okay. Now I would ask some advice.
There is a softball sized pumpkin that has formed under one of the flowers. It is perhaps 4 feet down the vine from the original planting hole. There are 2 other flowers with no pumpkins, located on the same vine and nearer the original planting hole.
To get the maximum size of the one pumpkin I've got, can someone give me some idea of what I need to do, i.e., eliminate any secondary vines or pull flowers or what? Any advice would be appreciated. I'm pretty excited to even have one pumpkin. But I'm fairly clueless as to culture of pumpkins. I am an experienced gardener though. Thank you for any replies.

I'm sorry but I didn't notice the post before mine was from Wayne, who gave me my Atlantic Giant plant.

Hey Wayne! It's doing pretty good. Eight more feet on the vine and it'll be out in the street unless I turn it somehow.

Thanks again. I'll send you some pictures to your email soon. And I am accepting advice! Help!

Deep Roots,
You can tell the female flowers, by the roundish bulb(ovary?) under the flower. The ones without this are the males, that contain the pollen.
Your pumpkin is quite close to the "stump". Many growers try for at least ten feet from the stump. Although I seem to remember a very large pumpkin grown at 6' out by someone. Some think most of the pumpkin growth comes from the plant before the pumpkin. Therefore they try for a large plant before the pumpkin. I think this is just a theory though.
You may want to get a pumpkin set out further than the one you have, and see if it grows faster. Some growers set a few pumpkins, monitor their growth, and go with the fastest grower.
What are your goals? Do you want the largest pumpkin you can get, or do you want two or three large ones.
Some people prune off every other secondary, though it seems many leave all, or most of the secondaries on.
How long you let the secondaries get depends partly on how much space you have. 10-15' secondaries seem to be a popular length range.
It is common to prune off all tertiary growth.
I don't know what effect pruning flowers would have. Some do, and some don't.
Feel free to ask any other questions. I'm no expert, but I think I've learned quite a bit from my growing experience from last year.
I should add, that if you have any leaves, or vines close enough to rub on the growing pumpkin, I'd remove them. They can scratch the pumpkin's skin, and take a little from it's final appearance. Of course, don't cut the vine that the pumpkin is growing on(although a seemingly minority of growers will cut this vine somewhere past(after) the pumpkin.)

Deep_roots: good to hear that your plant is doing well ! One of the big concerns I have is the eventual heatwave we're going to get and how the plants will cope with this. Haven't figured out what to do yet. Douglas is right, most growers set their pumpkins at least 10 feet from the stump or crown of the plant. I believe my two are too close (7 and 8.5 feet) and they're really not growing, so I'll be pollenating others further out. One of my two pumpkins is withering and the other looks healthy but has remained at tennis-ball size for the past week. I don't think it's a keeper, based on the growth rate I've read from other people.

A question: I'm also growing other types of pumpkins nearby (tom fox, baby bear). Should I be concerned about cross-pollenation (I'm not saving seeds) or is this a non-issue ? Thanks.

Not an issue Wayne.
Those two are pepo species, and wouldn't cross anyway.
If you did get cross pollination with another maxima species, it wouldn't affect your pumpkin this year, only the seed genetics.

Great, thanks Douglas. How are things going for you ?

Thanks Douglas. And Hi Wayne. My little pumpkin is too close to the "stump"? Not a problem. A squirrel stole it on Sunday. Dang! On Saturday, Mr. Squirrel nipped two male flowers and the flower on top of the pumpkin. Then he came back for the pumpkin. Sigh.

The good news is my main vine is growing fast and now I have a secondary vine shooting off of that. So I hope I will have more pumpkin chances. My plant looks good.
And fortunately I am a pro at fighting squirrels and keeping them out of my stuff. So Mr. Squirrel, I accept the challenge and that first pumpkin was just a WARNING!

Game on.

Well, my fruit set is now 45" on day 20. I'm not too dissapointed with this small measurement, though, because it looks like growth is picking up. For the last 10 days, I measured a consistent daily circumference gain of 2.5" a day; today I measured 3.5" of growth. I hope the trend continues! The seems as if the fruit will be very good looking. It is already shaping up almost exactly like its parent; the skin is still yellow, but it is amazingly glossy.

I will be out of town for the next 3 weeks, but I arranged for a "pumpkinsitter" to take care of my plants. Good luck to everyone! I'll post when I come back.

Wayne,
On three of my plants the mainvine has formed. Hopefully by this weekend, I'll have them laying on the ground. The other plant is smaller, as it was planted about a week later. It appears to be double vining.
It's been another year of a slow growing start. We had a month and a half mostly rainy days, and somewhat cool weather. Finally the weather is taking a turn towards temps. in the 80s and sun. By July 1, I'll be able to compare my plants of this year, to the one I grew last year. Last year the mainvine was 3'9".

Revilo,
In three weeks you could have a monster on the vine. I hope it grows well for you.

Douglas

I measured two of the plants yesterday, and now 24 hours later. One mainvine grew 6" and the other 4". I'm very pleased with this, as it was more than I expected. We had 90+ degree weather here today.
My top three plants now have a mainvine at around 2'7".
I'd be quite happy with 6-7' mainvines by July 1.

Thanks Douglas. hope everything works out for you.

Douglas: sounds like your weather has been much hotter than ours so far. I don't think we've had any 90+ days, yet. But hot summer days are the norm around here.

My plant is growing like a weed. The primary is about 15 feet long now; I must have 20 secondaries going. The longest is about 8 feet long, and I pollenated a pumpkin on it on Monday. It's still only about 3 3/4" diameter, but the one I pollenated on the 18th, about 12 feet out on the primary, is measuring 8" diameter. Seems to be doing well. I had taped the flowers shut on both of these after pollenating; I think that that's key. The other 3 where I didn't do this, all failed and none reached the 8" size, although a couple were close. I started a spreadsheet today to track the daily measurements.

I meant circumference, not diameter !

Here's some numbers to compare to my 615 lber. last year.

Day 10- 16.5" circumference
Day 20- 50.5 " circumference

I wish I would have made note of other measurement milestones. Hopefully this year I'll record more data.
Keep er' going Wayne!
I look forward to hearing of your progress.

Douglas

Thanks Douglas: I'm very optimistic about this baby. I realized why I didn't do it last year -- it was alot of infrastructure work getting my backyard setup for this. I put up an electric fence (30x25 feet), ran a 60 foot irrigation line back there, and also made a pathway on the slope as well as dug the holes and moved the soil. It was a ton of work. But, now that we're setup, it'll be easy for next year. I'm also growing Tom Fox and Baby Bear varieties -- actually all of these pumpkins I'm growing for my son, who is 2 and a half. It's going to be a great halloween this year !

Douglas, Where do I get seeds for A.G.? I'm growing a Big Max from seeds I found at Lowes. It's vine is out ten feet now with 2 pumkins forming at 5 feet and one at 10. The flowers haven't opened yet. I understand that I should only let 2 pumkins grow out. I'll keep reading your threads for more advice. Thanks.

Hanover301: you'll pretty much have to order them online, from a place like www.howarddill.com. There are also other sources where growers get together to swap / buy / sell seeds too, but I'm not too knowledgeable about these; I'm sure that Douglas is.

As for your Big Max, I'd try to pollenate all of those baby pumpkins. Use several male flowers to transfer the pollen and tape the petals of the female shut after pollenation. Then see how they do. You can always decide to cull some later, but you should probably pollenate all of them. You have a one-day window per flower.

Hanover,
I don't know what your goals are for your Big Max. Do you want a number of pupkins, or the largest one you can get?
I'd leave one pumpkin per each strong vine, if you want more than one(no more than one per vine). If your plant has one primary vine, and a number of secondary vines, you could have one keeper on the main, and have some other pumkpins on the secondary vines(one per secondary). I think I read in one of Don Langevin's books(Vol.2?), that some growers would train 3 or 4 strong growing vines, and grow a pumpkin on each one(on A.G. plants).
If you only grow one pumpkin on the plant, I'd set 2 or more on the mainvine, and keep the one that is growing best, cutting off the others.
There are websites that sell A.G. seeds of known genetics crosses. Many growers will send you seeds from their pumpkins, if you send them a bubble pack envelope, with postage.
A.G. seeds from known crosses seems to be preferable. The generic A.G. seeds you can purchase in seed racks, etc. doesn't seem to have the growth potential, from what I've heard from some growers. I don't have personal experience regarding this.
If you get A.G. seed from a known cross, you will have some idea of what to expect to regarding the fruit. Color and wall thickness are two things you can select for.

Douglas

Thanks Douglas and Wayne. Growing pumkins was kind of an after thought because I didn't think I had the room but then I realized I could start it at the base of my compost pile, down a small path and then out to a more open area. It's going so weel that it's spiked my interest in growing an A.G next year. As I said, I have 2 pumkins just moth ball size so I'll watch for opening flowers. At what point do you decide to cull the plant to one pumkin? I'm also spraying weekly with Daconil and feeding with fish emulsion although the compost pile is probably all it needs. How often do you water? The roots seem very shallow and my plant seems very thirsty.

Hi Hanover: I'm no expert on this but here are my comments:

culling: Keep track of what day you pollenate each pumpkin (make a spreadsheet). Measure the circumference of each pumpkin each day and record it. This will give you a clear indication of the growth rate of each one. Myself, I plan to cull when mine are around basketball-sized, possibly a little earlier. Some factors to consider when culling are rate of growth, shape, stem angle with the main vine (one that's closer to 90 degrees is best).

Remember, you only have a single day to pollenate each flower, and my understanding is that you want to do it in the morning, say 8-9 am, before it gets hot out. Make sure you tape the flower shut afterwards with masking tape, and also make sure you use multiple male flowers to pollenate.

watering: I'm watering 4 times a day, about a gallon and a half each time. One thing I would think you would want to avoid is sudden large amounts of water, to prevent splitting.

Good advice Wayne.
Also it may be best to cull gradually, so the keeper pumpkin doesn't get a sudden growth spurt, and explode.

Douglas

Hi Douglas: it's interesting that AG growers use very dramatic descriptive words, like "explode". This conjures up all kinds of visuals.

I've had a watermelon explode on me before. I made the mistake of picking it in the heat of the day. Brought it inside, and just tapped it and POP, it split open. It was really cool. Won't make that mistake again -- will always pick either in early morning or evening. I'd hate to have an AG explode.

Wayne,
This A.G growing can have a lot of ups and downs(I read about birds pecking your pumpkin).
My two worst fears are high winds and hail. I just got hit this evening by high winds. My best plant looks like it lost a few large leaves. I had a wind break around my plant on two sides, but it wasn't enough. The plant was looking awesome, but now not so hot. It should recover just fine. I've heard of some growers experiencing much hail damage, and still grow a pumpkin over 1000 lbs.
The downs can be a little depressing. I guess it puts things in perspective though.

Douglas

understood. Sure is interesting watching those babies grow though. I'm at 49 inches circumference now, and that thing is going to be hard to move. Didn't get my hammock completed this weekend but hope to on tuesday evening.

My pumpkins this year are a bit dissapointing. My AG is now only 166 pounds. It is still growing, though, so I hope it at least reaches 200 pounds. On the up side, this fruit (grown on the 495 Reiss) is quite beautiful. It has a nice middle orange color and extremely smooth and glossy skin, like its parent (I'll post pictures later in the season). The shape isn't perfect, though (tapering towards the blossom end).

Anyways, I'll try to do better next year. This fall, I will add 3-4 yards of manure (Our soil here is very poor; my biggest mistake this year was probably inadequate soil amendments) as well as extend the patch; I'll also read up on fertilizing, ect., what I can improve over this year. I'll be looking forward to next season!

Well, the pumpkin now weighs an estimated 210 pounds, so I have at least reached my "goal". The fruit is almost done growing; I went ahead and removed the shading structure, so as to allow it to acquire more color (seems to be working- the pumpkin is a darker orange than before). I'll be posting pictures as soon as possible!

945.5 Sherwood pumpkin hit day 30 today, with a wt. est. ot 310 lbs. It averaged an estimated 19 lbs./day during the last 5 days.
In comparison, my 615 lber. from last year hit the est. 300 lb. mark on day 41.
I hope the decent, steady growth continues on for many days yet. I'll try and post wt. estimates every 5 days.

Douglas

Oops, I meant to put this in my A.G. update thread. Oh well.

Here are a few pictures of my two pumpkins. I don't know how to post pictures directly on threads, so I posted them instead in the bigpumpkins.com photo gallery.

Self-pollinated fruit on the 495 Reiss:

http://bigpumpkins.com/displayphoto.asp?pid=3770&gid=1

http://bigpumpkins.com/displayphoto.asp?pid=3771&gid=1

http://bigpumpkins.com/displayphoto.asp?pid=3772&gid=1

Prizewinner fruit, crossed with the 495:

http://bigpumpkins.com/displayphoto.asp?pid=3773&gid=1