Growing Big Max here in Maryland - 1st time this year for these. I have several basketball sized pumpkins sitting out there and another 4-5 baseball sized. I'll probably start cutting off anymore because that's all I need and I can focus the energy to make the ones I have bigger. I had one REALLY big one that was basketball sized by last week June and it was well on the way to superstardom until my golden retriever decided to um . . . retrieve it. Don't know if what I'm doing is helpful or not, but I'll let you know just in case it helps. I've planted them with canteloupes and watermellons on a slight slope surrounding hills of corn and beans (3 sisters). I started them from seed in March indoors. I've been using sea kelp emulsion about every 3 weeks and Veggies Alive (from Gardens Alive) about once a month. Lots of mason bees all over the place every morning.

I suspect your pumpkin has a borer. If you look along the vine, probably, about where the wilting starts, you'll find a hole in the vine, with so tailings. You might want to cut that part of the vine. If you can locate the worm, inside the vine, you can stick a knife in it, kill it, and hope that the vine recovers. My experience is that they generally don't recover. George Tahlequah, OK

I have gone through all my plants once now, pulling them out- to date I've found around 12-13, with another one or two on the surface I pulled up before they could drill in. I'm still worried, though... the vine borers have a habit of drilling into leaves, which weakens or sometimes completely kills the leaves. My biggest vine has lost almost half of its leaves so far. Also, even though the eggs are still hatching, I can't use anything to spray them because I grow Romaine lettuce for my tortoise right by the pumpkins, and I would never risk something getting into his food. I heard someone say that wiping down the vine every day with a wet wash rag would stop at least some of them from getting in. Does this work? Thank you both for posting!!! By the way, does anyone know when the eggs should stop hatching in Iowa? (P.S.- Sorry that the image is sideways!)

Hello all, I have been having the same issues. Let me recount my story for you. I planted zucchini eight ball squash, yellow crooked neck squash, and butternut squash. They were all doing awesome and producing a lot of fruit. Then the snails arrived. They were eating all my fruit so I bought some natria slug and snail killer. Worked like a charm. I was watering the plant for 10 minutes 2 times a day, in the morning and in the evening. This brought out the white mold on the leaves. I tried using a milk and water mixture to spray the leaves as well as cutting off all the infected leaves. This kind of worked, but I have been battling it for 2 months, but not seriously trying. I cut the watering back to 1 time a day in the morning for 10 minutes. Recently I have switched it to 3 times a week for 10 minutes. But what I have noticed is that the new leaves yellow and quickly turn brown and die. What would be causing this? I have checked for vine borers by slitting open some leaf stems but I found nothing. Here are some more pictures. Whole garden New green leaves, yellow on the outside and dead leaves around the plant Lemon cucumber plants. Started out great and now leaves started yellowing and just now they are starting to brown Heres is a little bug hat I've seen around my plants...it looks like a discolored lady bug. Anything to worry about? Thanks! This post was edited by paperslammer on Fri, Sep 5, 14 at 11:27