Squash & cucumbers
Pumpkin
Full-size types want the ground.
- Indoors
- 3 wk (late Apr)
- Outside
- Direct late May to early Jun
- Where
- In ground (needs space)
- Sun
- Full sun
- Water
- Deep soak; heavier as fruit sizes, finger test
- Harvest
- Sep to Oct, hard rind
Care
- Water
- A deep soak every 3 to 4 days in July and August, every 5 to 7 in spring and fall, and heavier while the fruit is sizing up, always into the soil rather than over the leaves. Let the finger test set the pace, and never let it swing dry then drenched, or the blossom end rots.
- Sow
- 1 to 2 seeds a half inch deep per peat pot, thinned to the single strongest with scissors. In the bed give each hill compost worked deep, pie types 2 to 3 feet apart and the full-size vines the better part of ten feet to run.
- Start inside
- Mat at 85F; the roots resent disturbance, so peat pots that plant whole. Sprouts fast in that warmth, then under the lights 14 to 16 hours. Out to the hills once frost is past and the soil holds 70F, late May to early June, before they outgrow the pot.
- Feed
- A shovel of compost or castings dug into the hill starts it off. Feed as the vines start to run, fish and seaweed liquid every 2 weeks, not heavily up front. Hold the nitrogen down so fruit sets without rotting at the blossom end.
- Ready
- Ready when the rind is hard to a thumbnail and colored right through, before a hard freeze. Cut with a long stub of handle left on, and never lift the fruit by that handle, since a snapped one opens a wound. Cure a week or two in the sun to firm the skin.
- Trouble
- Sudden wilt with frass at the stem base: squash vine borer, collar the base in foil at planting and keep row cover on until bloom. Bronze egg clusters under the leaves: squash bugs by late summer, scrape them off and trap adults under a board laid beside the vine. Chewed seedlings: cucumber beetles, net the young plants and hand-pick in the cool morning.
In a bag?
- No
- A full-size pumpkin runs a vine ten feet or more and roots deep to size its fruit, well past a 15 gal bag; only a pie or mini type would even fit one. Give it open ground.
A couple of pumpkin vines sown by early June cover the porch in October and the pie plate in November. Full-size types get real ground; only pie and mini types tolerate a bag.
Growing
Direct sow in ground in late May or early June, or start in pots three weeks ahead; either way the vine wants ten feet of running room and full sun. A shovel of compost in the hill at planting carries it most of the way. Once two or three fruit set per vine, pinch the growing tips so the plant finishes what it started. Slide a shingle under each pumpkin to keep the ground side sound. Cut with a long handle once the rind is hard and fully colored, before frost, and cure in the sun for a week or two. The vines drink hardest while fruit is sizing; shorted in August, a porch-sized pumpkin finishes as a softball.
Varieties
New England Pie is the small dense classic for actual pie; Winter Luxury has the silkiest flesh going; Howden if the porch demands a big one.
Pests
The squash trifecta applies: vine borer at the stem in early summer, cucumber beetles on seedlings, squash bugs by August. Row cover early, foil at the stem base, and egg-cluster patrols keep a couple of vines healthy without spraying anything.
In the kitchen
Pie types roast and puree into freezer bags for the holidays. The seeds toast with salt the same afternoon the jack-o-lantern gets carved.