I read somewhere that you should cut the tips of the leaders off once they reach a few feet long, to promote formation of more female flowers. Pumpkins always produce male flowers first. It also helps to hand pollenate.

We always pollinate by hand, and as Sparaxis says, you don't always get flowers of both sexes until they have been flowering for a while. (In case you don't know it, the female has a bulge under it that becomes the fruit, the male doesn't). As soon as you have flowers of both sexes pick a male one and do your birds and bees imitation to all the open females. As Sparaxis also says, restricting runner growth forces more energy into fruit development.

Hi Chev5700,
next time you grow pumpkins you need cross pollination with other vines, different pumpkins, melons etc. to get a good set of fruit. Growing one variety on its own will always give a poor result, no matter how many flowers you get. Thats why farmers grow large crops and at each end of the crop, they always plant a few different vines, melons,calabash, squash etc, and a few beehives as well, to get best results. Good luck. Peter r.

thanx to all
stratton