Pumpkins?

[jack]

Gidday

Well with all this here global warm everyone is raving about, we seem to be getting shorter, later and cooler summers. ]

There is a saying down here about pumpkins, that they need to be running before Christmas but with the warming of the globe it's been too cold to get the things going.

Is there any way to speed up the growth and ripening of pumpkins, like isin they are restricted as to how far they can run or something?

[Christy]

wow i never herd of starting pumpkins before christmas. i dont know much about New Zealand either. whats running? the root or vine?
you could start them indoors or a greenhouse. i use pop bottles with the tops n bottoms cut off. rolled up newspaper inside the bottle so i can plant them out when the weather warms up.just dig a hole n set it in then cut the bottle,fill around it then slide the bottle off. ya need room for the roots to grow so the dont get rootbound.
if im right for the vines it depends on if ya want 1 large pumpkin or smaller pumpkins on it. if ya want a large pumpkin ya need to cut off the extra vines so the energy gose to makin the one. if ya want more than one let it grow.
im no pumpkin expert but starting them indoors is the speedy way, you just need somthin long enough for the roots to grow n a way to plant them without disturbing the roots to much. n i think its the sun that ripens them faster. i only think that cause those who grow the giants cover theirs up with tarps or whatever to keep the sun from ripening them.

[Pharmer Phil]

Jan 1, 2010 0:50:53 GMT -6 jack said:

Gidday

Well with all this here global warm everyone is raving about, we seem to be getting shorter, later and cooler summers. ]

There is a saying down here about pumpkins, that they need to be running before Christmas but with the warming of the globe it's been too cold to get the things going.

Is there any way to speed up the growth and ripening of pumpkins, like isin they are restricted as to how far they can run or something?

Jack, you could feed the vines at the internodes , at each internode the pumpkin or squash vine sends down and anchors itself with a fist full of roots, and there's even
bigger ones where the main vine sends off secondaries.

After you have a few pumpkins growing, you could terminate the vine tip, forcing the plant to center it's efforts on maturing the pumpkins left on the vine.

[jack]

Gidday

That;'s what I was thinking of doing but just wanted to here you pumpkin experts say so too.

Cheers