Hey yall,
It's getting close to that time again. Who here grows giant vegetables? I grow squash over the 25-30# range yearly without much effort. It seems like anything with a vine does well on my farm-squash, cucumbers, zucchini, cantaloupe, watermelon, etc. This year, I'm thinking I'm going to try my hand at growing some giant pumpkins. Does anyone have any advise? I imagine I am going to have to put something under the pumpkin (tile, board, etc?) to prevent worms from burrowing into the underside. Anyone care to share some insight on what to do, to be successful? I have real expectations, I know on my first time I wont grow 600-1000# pumpkins. I have some Atlantic Giant seeds, and honestly I'd be tickled to just grow a 100 pound pumpkin.

I had an uncle who won the local pumpkin contest several years in a row. He saves the seeds from the biggest ones to get more of the biggest ones.

He would remove all competing pumpkins from the vine and leave only 1. He would also put that one pumpkin on top of a sheet of plywood on top of a pallet. That way he could pick up his 800# pumpkin with a fork lift and load it into the truck.

Here is a few laughs..... 1:18

I have heard that milk feeding helps make it grow extra big with the advice above. Also, trim all the developing extensions after the pumpkin is established(and you will need to do it almost daily because they grow fast and big and numerous). Make sure that there are no squash bugs on your plant. And lastly, try to keep it nice and fertilized and do basic weeding practices.

I mean if you do just two of the suggestions, you could probably get one around that weight.

P.S. If you have deer in your area(or any other critter), you may want to put some marigolds around your plant so that they don't munch on your pumpkin or vine(talking from experience). That way you have a natural repellent while also making your garden look nicer at the same time.

At every leaf intersection place it under some soil to grow roots, and the plant will take in extra nutrition that way.
Have some slow drip irrigation, like 5 gallon containers that take 16 hours to drain around those extra roots.
Cold well water shocks then when watering.
400 # easy
500# challenge
600+# your going to a weigh in for sure.

starting early seedling has no effect compared to direct in the ground.
But we have more daylight in the critical time period.

Two years ago I grew an OSSchool cabbage for a friends grandson. They get to 40 lbs. His 3rd grade classmate had a school sponsored contest. Problem occurred and a hard freeze killed nearly every students plant. Mine survived but the contest fizzled out. I found a plant a few weeks ago and put it in a large plastic container. We’ll see what happens.

Only other large veggie I have grown were jumbo peanuts in the 70s.

I love the OS Cross cabbage. 30-40# is normal. My friend hit nearly 60# with one of his.

I grew some big sunflowers last year. The biggest grew infront of the house where watering was easy to do when needed. The biggest was 15 feet tall with a 16 inch diameter head. I had a bunch more break 14 feet but not as large of a head.

bigpumpkins.com is a good site about growing giant pumpkins. Don't worry. I promise it really is a pumpkin site.



I have an interest in growing giant stuff but being in the south it's a hard row to hoe.

Bigpumkins.com is an excellent site to learn to grow giant pumpkins. WorldClassGardening is a great site for seeds from giant vegetables.

I'm no expert on giant pumpkins, and even though I like to pick my zucchini when they are small, if I don't check them for three days I come back to some that are 3 feet long and weigh 40 pounds. I should write a book.

Pete

I have grown many zucchini to impressive size (never actually weighed them). I actually prefer the larger zucchini for grating for regular and chocolate zucchini bread. I have had many Cushaw squash in the 25-35# range. They get made into pies or used as decoration.





LOL I work for the Feds, and everything is monitored. I'm a little leery of a site that says "big pumpkins" I'll have to wait until I'm off work to check that out.