Pumpkin Advice

anyacolo

Hello All,

i am a novice to intermediate gardener, i have a fairly large garden and planted about 25 sweet corn in one section, 25 sunflowers in another section, and 8 pumpkin plants in another section,

everything is thriving and doing very well, especially the pumpkin plants,

the 8 pumpkin plants are in a section that is about 8 feet by 4 feet, spaced evenly apart, in 2 rows of 4 plants, is this too close together?

when i planted the seeds i wasn't expecting them to all come up, or grow as well as they have, so i thought i would plant more to be safe, but they all did come up and grow very well,

should i be removing some of them?....or are they okay that close together?

anyacolo

philippa smith2 said:

That's a lot of Pumpkin plants for the space you describe.  Join the club in that you have sown seeds not expecting them to all germinate.........but they do !!  I think it's known as Sod's Law

You could assess the weaker ones and remove them but at this stage of growth, I'd be tempted to leave all in situ and try to keep them in trim so you get only 2 or 3 fruit on each plant.  Heavy feeders, they usually require more spa e than you have allowed.

As with most gardening problems - suck it and see

thanks......i would be more then happy with only one pumpkin on each

i planted pumkins the last 2 years, i got big bright flowers but never actually got a pumpkin to grow....however this year they seem to be doing MUCH BETTER....growing like weeds with HUGE leaves

Jason-3

Pumpkins are vast plants...given the right growing conditions. One plants would fI'll your bed on its own. I'd suggest focusing on two plants maximum. Once you have 2 good fruits per plant, discard any new fruits or flowers so that the plant cant focus it's energy on its fruits
They are also hungry feeders.if you loathed to give them you could try growing a few vertically?