The 2005 Season ............
Again this year I started the patch prep with 12 yards of leaf compost. Manure would be good but I always seem to have problems finding a way to actually get it here at an affordable price. The cost of the manure isn't so bad but the trucking cost make it unreasonable. I'm happy with the leaf compost and in the long run does it really matter if it's been through the cow or not. My neighbors don't mind the compost and some have express displeasure with the mountain of manure in the past. The pile of compost leaves them with envy..........................
If you had read my 2004 page then you would already know about my anti weed program. I was so happy with the results last year I have made it standard procedure now. It sure beats spending endless hours pulling weeds and the plants seem to like it.
Well that was quick. It's now September and now new web page entries. I started 4 seeds, 898Knauss and 3 of my own 707Toftness seeds. The 898 went in one patch and one of the 707 in the other. I put a 707 in the opposite corner of each patch just to have enough male flowers when the time came.
The 707 was a vigorous plant as they have always been for me. The 898 was a disappointingly slow grower. The first female on the 707 appeared out about 12 feet and I wanted to do the 707 x 898 cross but the 898 had other ideas. Actually there were no males on any of the 4 plants. Not wanting to miss the chance for a June pollination I called Alan Reynolds to see if he had males. He was off to his worst start ever but he did have male flowers and was generous enough to let me have some. I arrived at his patch early in the morning to find a complete map of his patches and the locations of all the males he had covered the night before. Alan you need to do something about those trained attack flies in your patch. It was all I could do to get the males and escape. They were successful at keeping me away from the 845Bobier males. I used the males from Alan's 851 current state record holder to pollinate the 707.
6 July....finally another pollination opportunity on the 707. Its later than I wanted and I'm out of patch space. At least there are 898 males available for this one. The other problem is that its pouring rain. Rain is never a good thing on pollination days but I'll make the most of it. In past years I always rush the pollinations so I can get to work without being to late. There are always some pollination failures and I wonder if its related to the very early (almost forced) pollinations. This year I decided I'll get to work whenever I'm done. The males and females have been covered with additional plastic bags the night before to not only keep out the bees but also to ensure that they stay dry. This time I collect the males and bring them inside to wait. I wait until 9am to actually do the deed. Because of the rain I setup bamboo stakes to support an umbrella while I try to do the pollination while keeping everything dry.
8 July....The 898 plant is two weeks behind the 707 in size. It looks OK but its just a slow grower. Today it finally has a female ready to open but it's not as far out as I would like, only 11 1/2 feet and I can't wait any longer. The next female won't be ready for more than a week so this is it. This one will be crossed with the 707. Like the 707 2 days ago...its raining again.
18 July...This is day 20 for the first pollination on the 707 plant and day 12 for the second one. I need to decide which fruit to keep and cull the other one. The older one is 63" circumference and has a larger than normal blossom scar while the other one is 40" with a small blossom scar. I whack the older one and wonder what have I done. It was 50 pounds bigger, oh well to late now.
26 July...Its been 8 days and the 'second' pumpkin on the 707 plant is now 20 days old. How does it compare to the one I culled? The circumference is 77.5 " which makes it twice as big as the one I culled at the same age. I'm happy and the pumpkin is growing.
6 August...Today was the CTGS&PGA Patch Tour. We saw some nice pumpkins and patches. The low point of the tour was the last stop. Of course that was my patch. Everything was fine until Ray spotted a stem split on my 707 that I hadn't seen yet. Thanks Ray, if you hadn't spotted it I may not have been able to treat it soon enough to prevent a disaster.
14 August...Why settle for one stem split when you can have two. Yes, I found a second stem split on the 707. All I can do is treat them with more fungicides and keep the dry. Both the 898 and the 707 continue to grow well. The 898 Knauss is slowly gaining on the 707 and its 2 days younger.
20 August ...was not a good day in the patch. If you look at the picture at the top of this page you can see a tiny little dark spot between two of the ribs on top. 43 days and 331 OTT still growing 19 pounds on each of the 4 previous days. Its the biggest thing in the patch this year and now it has a split. Nothing for me to do now but get it out of here before it rots. This is one of the days I wish I had a truck. 780 pounds on my uncertified scale.
September...The struggle with powdery mildew continues again this year. With most of the leaves gone I let some pop up ternaries grow so there will be at least a few leaves to support the fruit. I stopped measuring the 707 after it showed no growth for 2 weeks. Now all I can do is hope it holds on until weighoff. The good news is that the 2 stem splits seem to be stable and I continue to keep the stem very dry.
21 Sept....An ongoing problem for me is how to load the pumpkin each year as the pumpkins get bigger and lifting friends get fewer. Thanks to Andy W. I now have plans to make a tripod to lift the pumpkin and load it onto a truck. I took the day off from work so I can make the tripod and test it for the lifting project this evening. I used 3, 16 ft. 4x4's and a 5/8" threaded rod at the top along with some heavy chain. It's actually much easier to do than I expected but the first attempt to set it up was a near miss as my younger son lost control of one of the 4 x 4's. With better planning and instruction the second attempt went smoothly.
It's unsettling to watch a years work hang in mid air while being hoisted higher and higher. This is a prime opertunity to get a look at the bottem and it's flat and solid. Again this year I owe my buddy Joe (on the ladder) my thanks for his help and most of all his truck. Well now it's off the to Durham to get her weighed. I'm not expecting much but it should be a new personal best. When the weight is announced I'm sure they are trying to put one over on me. It can't weigh that much. I had to look at the readout myself. It's a new personal best for sure and a lot heavier than expected. The weight is 905.2 pounds !! What I thought was a dull season has turned into a great one for me. I thought I would be 4th or 5th but instead I got second at the Durham fair.
Jake watches over the pumpkin patches all summer and this is his one and only chance to get close to a pumpkin. He thinks it is his.
