This is my first year gardening, and no amount of internet research has stopped me from making a bunch of mistakes.

I am trying to grow "Small Sugar Pie" pumpkin. My only plant started well in a jiffy-puck inside a covered tray, and I planted it up to a 4" coco fiber pot without removing the filter. I didn't give it any nutrients until almost too late, and then gave it too much, but it seemed to recover eventually. I planted the 4" pot into a 12" pot as the plant got bigger. I began hardening it off in that 12" pot a month ago.

Then the leaves started turning yellow and a bunch of buds appeared. I thought it might be rootbound again so I went to repot it - discovering that the filter and the fiber pot both had severely restricted it's roots. I gently removed as much of the material as I could and the wasted yellow leaves and replanted into it's final home - a 20 gal pot on my porch. The root ball was about the size of a baseball for the 8" long main plant stem. It gets ~13 hours of sun currently and 1L of water every day (very dry air here). The question is whether it will survive with the major root loss caused by this most recent repot. I gave it some mild sugar water and after a couple days a quarter dose of fish emulsion. I'm keeping it watered and covering it overnight against the low 50 degree weather.

I have some questions:

Should I pinch off the buds to promote root growth? Is it too early for them?

Will covering it with tarred felt and keeping it close to the house protect it when the weather inevitably drops to the 30's? (I don't expect below 32 degs) I can bring it inside if I have to.

Should I fertilize more, less, or the same? I was giving 5/5/5 every other week before, was planning to use 10/10/10 next. On off weeks I give a half dose of fish emulsion.

It strongly grabbed hold of the trellis I gave it overnight - should I train more of it's leaves to the dirt so it can make auxiliary roots, or let it climb?

Since it is my only plant, I'd rather not let it die. I was hoping to get two or three 6" fruits from it before the frost sets this fall. Is this still realistic?

I really appreciate your help, these forums have been a vast source of knowledge so far.

Here is a link that might be useful: Three other pictures