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Florida Gardening

Ok...time to plant my jack o lantern seedlings

15 years ago

I googled, but I have not found a great deal of info. I did find here: 6X6 area...compost (cow or chicken) 666 fert...dress every 3 weeks...also mulch good...hay mulch...but what area sun or shade and water how much daily for so many days like others..then every couple of days...etc.

Can anyone help with this?

I really want to decorate with my own pumpkins this yr at halloween (oh yeah...I'm a really big kid at the holidays) and make scratch pumkin pies and breads!

Thanks in advance as usual for all your wisdoms!!!

Kim

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Comments (3)

minibim
15 years ago
I think you're almost to late for Halloween, don't they need like 90 days minimum for mature fruit?

Definitely full sun and like the rest of the pain in the butt curcubits, they like water, but too much water you get mildew and stuff. A 6x6 area will not be large enough.
scents_from_heaven
15 years ago
I am enclosing a link for growing pumpkins in Florida. It is not too late but you need 6x6 per vine in sun.

Here is a link that might be useful: Pumpkins
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Good going, Dax. Your little corner of paradise is well on its' way. I'm going to start putting in seedlings this weekend, provided they ship in time. Stuff went out today from N. Minnesota (Itasca Greenhouse). Have no idea how long this will take to get here, but I suspect it will arrive any day now. 200 Norway spruce, 100 ponderosa pine, and 100 hybrid larch. Last Fri. I planted some more red-twigged dogwoods. These were free plants I dug up from where they were growing against a fence at one of our worksites. Stolonifera indeed! I will also be moving a fair number of Thuja o's from the woods up into the main planting area. Dax, next storm system, could you please set up a large fan and blow some of that moisture up this way? Since the beginning of April, we've pretty much had a blocking high pressure hanging over us.......lots of cool, dry air, winds out of the North/Northeast, which this time of year is a very dry direction. Conditions are great for the actual planting, but then I'm gonna need it to rain. I really have no reasonable way to water all this stuff. Kens' free-range concept taken to its' fullest extent! +oM
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That's great!
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Jack-be-little grow more like an ornamental gourd than a pumpkin with the respect to the number of fruit you will get. If they have turned a deep orange like a pumpkin then there is a good chance they are done. I wouldn't pick them unless they have spent at least a month growing on the vine. Personally I wouldn't remove the Jack-be-little plant simply because they are so productive. The other pumpkins you have just aren't near as productive. You might only get one or two pumpkins on each vine from the Sugar Pie and Howden plants. If your Jack-be-little plant is too big you could try pruning the vines. You can just pinch the tips on the vines and they will stop getting longer, but they will branch out and you would have to cut those back as they grow too. Oh and you can eat Jack-be-littles, they are the perfect size to stuff.
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Mid-season update: I did end up removing one plant and leaving 2. They are happy and sprawling up the fence and a bit over each side of the 8x3' box: So far it hasn't invaded the other half of the box with the scrawny melon, but if it does, it's not a loss. Plus I find wrapping it back in on itself helps contain it. I have one good-sized pumpkin and a baby one that's hanging on the fence, so I'm going to fashion a sling for that one. I did have a rather large attack of cucumber beetles right after my original post, but knock on wood, no squash vine borers. All in all, I'm glad to have planted it despite my fear of its size!
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sultry_jasmine_nights (Florida-9a-ish)
15 years ago
We planted some pumpkins and a bunch of other stuff about a month ago. I wasn't gonna do a veggie garden this year since we recently moved here and it was getting late in the season for some stuff, but the kids wanted one so we decided to risk it. We put down some black cow and mixed it in with the soil before we planted. I am positive we didn't give the big pumpkins enough room though lol~ so I am sure this will be a comedy of errors!

Small baby boo pumpkins and such can be trained up an A-frame or other trellis but the big ones get too heavy to tie up.
I got some worm poo stakes to make a tea with for the pumpkins this year (kinda an experiment).

Please keep us posted with yours, I would like to hear how it progresses.
~SJN

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