A Word on Pumpkins

I decided to grow pumpkins this year. I had an October baby, so it seemed fitting to try to grow them. And I really want to take baby & pumpkin pictures for his first birthday.

So I picked up a couple of seedlings this spring at the local greenhouse. With the promise that they would grow 8 feet each. For weeks they were the only plants in my garden so I diligently watered them and planned photo shoots in my head. Then they froze during the May Long weekend and the nighttime temperatures hovered around freezing for over a week. I covered the little pumpkins, hoping to save them, but a week later when the weather finally turned around and I uncovered them, they were in a very, very sad state. Just to see if they would bounce back, I left them in the garden, but went out and bought another plant. One that was already half a metre in size.

The new plant thrived and quickly doubled, then tripled its size. And then the frozen pumpkins started to grow again! I was thrilled at the thought of so many more pumpkins. Soon they started to flower and tiny little pumpkins were popping up everywhere. I was telling my mom of all the pumpkins that were growing and she informed me that I would likely have to help them along. Bringing the male flowers to visit the female flowers to make sure the flowers were properly fertilized. "Yeah right. As if I'm going to do that. There are enough bees around to do the job." I was so not going to help them along.

The ones that froze. Each 8 feet in diameter now.

The "newer" one that stretches over 12 feet, with 6 feet taking up grass.

Though the plants were taking more and more of my garden over, my crop of tiny little pumpkins never grew and started to rot. In telling my mother-in-law about the pumpkins, she also said I was going to have to "pimp" them or risk not getting any pumpkins. Every morning for the last 2 weeks I've been going out to "check" on my pumpkins and help them along. The first time I felt awful. Dirty. But it got easier and easier to the point where I didn't even feel bad about chucking the used male flowers over the fence when I was done with them. The best part is my work has paid off. I have several pumpkins that are growing like mad.

About the size of a mini watermelon

The size of a grapefruit

Of course, this has led me to wonder how pumpkins have survived over the many thousands of years if they couldn't get the job done on their own.