Click on a thumbnail picture below to see the full size version. 92 Entries. Friday, March 25 View Page Winter thaw has begun and thoughts of planting something soon is also on the mind. Happy growing everyone!   Friday, March 25 View Page Planting spots have been amended, soil heat cables installed and will put the ends on and seal up the hoophouses to start retaining some heat. Will also have heaters with thermostat set at a comfy temperature, especially over night.   Friday, March 25 View Page 1911 Chan is the chosen seed to represent us this year at the Saanich Fair. We have started seeds about a month early and will have these in the heated soil for the first week of April. That is a full month early, but the Saanich Fair is a month earlier than all the other local Weighoffs, so I’d like to have a 90-100 day old fruit by the time the Fair rolls around ar the end of August.   Sunday, March 27 View Page 2 days later and the 1911 Chan seedlings look like this! Another 4 or 5 days under the lights and I’ll start hardening them off to be planted outside first week of April. Will get the soil cables plugged in and warming the soil in advance of planting day.   Wednesday, March 30 View Page Going all Richmond Dave this year, here are 2 of his 1911 Chan seedlings with the Saanich Fair plant being planted today. Heat cables and a small heater will keep things toasty warm inside here. Earliest planting by far, I sure hope the heat cables do their job.   Monday, April 4 View Page Yup, bringing out the big guns now. Richmond Dave generously gave me the seed that grew his British Columbia record 1911 Chan. I see this seed has done well in many patches in many places by many growers, so I’ll try my best. Again, starting competition plants a bit earlier this year in hopes of earlier pollination and longer growing time.   Sunday, April 17 View Page Yeah, my plan to build another more permanent larger hoophouse around the lower hoop is gonna wait till we find some more time. Instead, We are making each end of the lower hoop longer to give the already growing back to back 1911 Chan plants more room to lie down and expand.   Monday, April 18 View Page End product is suitably longer and will do the trick but talk about some hillbilly building and engineering techniques, man that is a lot of clips! You can see both 1911 Chan seedlings are happy and healthy. Without heat cables and a heater, there is no way I could start this early.   Saturday, April 23 View Page As usual for me, the kickstand leaf (2nd true leaf) was removed for interfering with the vine and growth cluster to land safely on the ground. Also trimmed some early secondaries that would have been eliminated later anyways. Seeing tendrils, always a good sign. Been cold overnight, frost and ice…some slight yellowing but as the soil heats up, that will not be an issue.   Thursday, April 28 View Page Off and running, the 1911 Richmond Dave plant is doing well. The 2118 Barron was just planted in its mini hoophouse a few days ago, no heater in there, just the soil cables. We are also going to plant a patch later on of prizewinner plants again and grow a few biggies of those.   Wednesday, May 4 View Page And away we go! 1911 Chan stretching out and looking for more room, a low rider so it looks easy to tame. Bring it on Saanich Fair.   Sunday, May 8 View Page 1911 Chan South is 3 or 4 days from out-growing it’s end of the hoophouse with main vine and secondaries.   Sunday, May 8 View Page 1911 Chan North settled down and heading towards its end of the hoophouse also. Cleaned up a few strangler leafs and did some early vine and rooting burying along the main and secondaries. Irrigation system getting set up, but now that I’ve got multiple pumps, I’ll hook one up to the 50 gallon tank and water by hand when the plants are smaller. For the first year I’ll be adjusting the PH of my tanked warmed feritgated water. When I need the 250 gallon tank, I’ll use it.   Friday, May 13 View Page So, another hillbilly fix for extending the hoop using remay so that we can hold some heat in at night. Like others living in the Pacific Northwest, the weather is unusually cold, wet and unpredictable. We had frost this morning, but things are looking good for the weeks ahead.   Friday, May 13 View Page A little early, at about only 7’ on the main vine. Hoophouses will need to be taken off in the next five days as the plants are widening faster than they are lengthening.   Friday, May 13 View Page Maybe I should water…I’ve been very stingy with H20 inside the hoophouses, since so much has fallen everywhere else. The roots must be finding enough, but I’m still so tempted to start with kelp, humic, Ureamate, and our other rotation of goodies. Nothing so far, so I’ll wait on my temptation until the hoophouses are down and I can fertigate a larger area around the plants like my pal So.Cal.Grower. Reminds me, another coat of paint and stain needed on my patch sign.   Sunday, May 15 View Page Busting out, both plants are a little hardened off, no heat overnight in hoops for the past 2 nights and they seemed to flourish.   Sunday, May 15 View Page I’ve been mowing the cover crop around the hoops, now I will begin working the soil and adding the prescribed final amendments to the soil that Richmond Dave and I discussed at length, thanks Dave.   Friday, May 20 View Page Well, we once again had our seasonable expected swirling coastal windstorms and we were yet again unprepared. Some hastily thrown up snow fencing was employed as a wind break, but it didn’t stop the plants from getting beaten up pretty badly with twisted and broken leafs and stalks. It will of course repair, but next year we will be more prepared for the inevitable winds.   Sunday, May 22 View Page 1911 Chan is self repairing from the wind damage and like Cindy, my most unfavourable task in the patch of vine burying has begun. Is funny when you adjust, amend, bury, bamboo stakes only to look at the plant the very next morning and wonder “did I miss a day?” Secondaries are outpacing the main, so this will be a low riding, thick and wide plant that will tolerate my butchering and thinning out. Andrew Hawthorne who?   Monday, May 23 View Page First male flower to show up today, there will be a steady stream from now on and looking back from previous years, We will need about 2 weeks more growth before I’ll get a female flower in a good spot for pollination.   Friday, May 27 View Page So, we decided a larger hoophouse is needed for the early Saanich Fair plant, and more effective wind breaks need to be installed ahead of time in future years. Pretty happy with this plant, time will tell.   Thursday, June 23 View Page Pollination day for one of the 1911 Chan plants, it’s the second pollination on the main vine and I’ll make the cut down to the chosen one, once the plant has filled out a bit more and things are fully set.   Tuesday, June 28 View Page In the “better late than never” category, we had 15 yards of premium compost delivered today.   Tuesday, June 28 View Page With precision accuracy, the operator flung the compost over a couple of plants (yes, the have some yellowing) and made piles for us for top dressing and vine burying.   Tuesday, June 28 View Page Never again will we order any soil products and simply have them dropped in the driveway for us to move and spread. This was the smartest $160 per hour I have ever spent on the deliver of compost and soil to our new location.   Tuesday, June 28 View Page Never again will we order any soil products and simply have them dropped in the driveway for us to move and spread. This was the smartest $160 per hour I have ever spent on the deliver of compost and soil to our new location.   Tuesday, June 28 View Page Never again will we order any soil products and simply have them dropped in the driveway for us to move and spread. This was the smartest $160 per hour I have ever spent on the deliver of compost and soil to our new location.   Wednesday, June 29 View Page Photo, for the last double entry.   Wednesday, June 29 View Page Photo, for the last double entry.   Wednesday, June 29 View Page Well, my photos aren’t showing but here goes another try. A newer grower from BC was asking and here is my example. I culled down to one pumpkin today and eliminated this pumpkin based on a few things. Short stem, bad angle, more secondaries and bigger plant behind the next one down the main.   Saturday, July 16 View Page Day 23 for this 1911 Chan (Richmond Dave). Over 60” in circ and growing fast, I’ve not done OTT yet but will begin that on day 30.   Saturday, July 16 View Page 2 pollinations on the 2118 Barron, one of them will get the cut soon. This plant is a few weeks late, but is filling in quickly and will be the last pumpkin harvested for Weighoff with its placement in the patch.   Sunday, July 17 View Page Well, when I said that I’d cull one of the pumpkins on the Barron plant, I didn’t really mean the next day but I looked at the calendar and realized I’m 10 days to 2 weeks behind where I want to be for pollination dates. Despite my own advice to newer growers, I went ahead and chopped the bigger/older fruit and went with the 4 day old freshly pollinated pumpkin. The plant itself is in hyper growth mode and secondaries are grasping at the soil with plenty of upper and lower rooting along the vines. We got a good initial bend in the vine and have great positioning for this pumpkin to grow big. Will grow tertiary vines on the opposing secondary to fill in that remaining space.   Sunday, July 17 View Page Now this is the 1911 Chan (North) and finally got a baby on the main vine after refusing to produce one earlier. Female flowers all over the secondaries, was just stubborn on the main, but finally pollinated on July 12th with 14 secondaries on each side all at 15’ each. Here is the brain teaser, the 1911 Chan (South plant) has regular sized leaves and some moderate yellowing (early cold I believe) and the 1911 Chan (North plant) is a very delicate plant with small, abundant leaves, incredible rooting but has very yellow leaves (also I believe because of the cold June). The “B Gene” is possible since all 3 of our plants are displaying the same characteristic, and are all from the same lineage.   Sunday, July 17 View Page Now this is the 1911 Chan (North) and finally got a baby on the main vine after refusing to produce one earlier. Female flowers all over the secondaries, was just stubborn on the main, but finally pollinated on July 12th with 14 secondaries on each side all at 15’ each. Here is the brain teaser, the 1911 Chan (South plant) has regular sized leaves and some moderate yellowing (early cold I believe) and the 1911 Chan (North plant) is a very delicate plant with small, abundant leaves, incredible rooting but has very yellow leaves (also I believe because of the cold June). The “B Gene” is possible since all 3 of our plants are displaying the same characteristic, and are all from the same lineage.   Tuesday, July 19 View Page Shape changer alert! If you look at the picture from July 16, we had just put down the board and sand and adjusted the pumpkin so the vine entering and blossom end were equidistant from the ground. We also made sure we blocked up the extra slack in the vine, a great practice taught to me by SoCal Chris. I always admired his diary photos of perfectly placed and supported vines, and we spent considerable time at one of the conferences and online, about this technique. But Wow!! 3 days later and many inches in circumference, this fruit became a shape changer and needed to be adjusted again, but down this time, eliminating some of the blocks in the process. We had a great conversation with Chris (including photos) and we devised a plan to adjust this pumpkin before it was too late and it became more unmanageable.   Tuesday, July 19 View Page We took out the vine support nearest the stem, and went from this angle…..   Tuesday, July 19 View Page …pushed the pumpkin back forward, filled in the back end with stockpiled sand and got the main vine back down towards the ground. Now, why did we do this? As this pumpkin continues to grows in height and width, it will re-raise the vine slack that we just lowered and will not cause or add to any pre-existing stem or vine stress.   Tuesday, July 19 View Page …pushed the pumpkin back forward, filled in the back end with stockpiled sand and got the main vine back down towards the ground. Now, why did we do this? As this pumpkin continues to grows in height and width, it will re-raise the vine slack that we just lowered and will not cause or add to any pre-existing stem or vine stress.   Saturday, July 23 View Page Day 30 for the 1911 Chan (south) and pretty happy with it so far. I’m lagging behind Richmond Dave again, and until I build and grow in an indoor setting, I’m afraid 2nd is the best most of us in British Columbia can achieve at the scales. Planted early this year and got later than normal pollinations, go figure!! Day 13 at 21” circumference for the 1911 Chan (North) and Day 12 at 25” circumference for the 2118 Barron. Both these pumpkins (if they make it to October) will entered in the later Weighoff.   Sunday, July 24 View Page Someone was recently asking about vine burying and weeding, so I wanted to follow up with a photo to illustrate what we do. Yes, we weed and prep the soil in front of the secondaries with a broadfork. Then, with stockpiled compost/peat moss and perlite mixed, we perform a vine burying method somewhere between the Paton’s pot method and Richmond Dave’s vine burying method. Then, after that if weeds grow, then they grow under the pumpkin leaf canopy.   Thursday, July 28 View Page 2118 Barron at day 15, will get a tape put around it in another few days. Put down a piece of plywood, some pulp mill belting and a little sand to help it slide along as it starts to expand. I’ll use sand around the base of the plywood when it starts to grow over. We did a cool cross with this pumpkin, pollinated with Richmond Dave’s BC Record 1911 Chan (2118 Barron X 1379 Chan).   Friday, July 29 View Page 1911 Chan in front and 2118 Barron in the back. The 1911 pumpkin is evolving in shape, I think we dodged the bum over blossom, but time will tell. Consulted with my buddy SoCal Grower for advice on stem/vine adjustments and sliding the young pumpkin backwards to straighten up a main vine. Thanks Chris!!   Friday, July 29 View Page 2118 Barron after vine/stem adjustment, will get a measurement soon.   Friday, July 29 View Page 1911 Chan (North) also got a major vine adjustment, pulled the pumpkin back to straighten the main vine and adjusted the blossom and stem end so that they are equidistant to eachother from the ground. We didn’t do the adjustment on the other 1911 Chan (south) early enough and that is why it is tilting back somewhat and too late now.   Saturday, July 30 View Page 1911 Chan (south) is ripping along at 33 lbs a day and rising. Showing a nice orange starburst on its rather unimpressive small stem.   Saturday, July 30 View Page Our 1911 Chan (south) is not quite the bum-over like Richmond Dave’s 1911 pumpkin, but it is trying. Day 40 soon, so hopefully the numbers are good enough to justify a new posting.   Sunday, July 31 View Page Having a text conversation with Richmond Dave today and he was mentioning the dreaded Powdery Mildew and the fact that “so far” neither of us has seen it in the patch this year yet. We’ve got it big time on all the neighbourhood maple trees, so it’s no far away. So, we did a foliar application of Bravo and Merit, mixed with a little Ureamate to make sure the plant got greedy and would suck it all in and distribute it around the entire plant.   Monday, August 1 View Page So, the hooptie-house goes back up and a rain cover installed. We also the cover the unit with remay or a shade cloth to keep the heat down. It’s mainly to keep the pumpkin dry since we overhead water. Day 40 today and the numbers indicate a good trend upwards, we always get our best sustained daily gains from day 30-50 and then the fruit follows a descending pattern r daily gains. Goal is to keep plant as health as possible, filling in all available soil space with foliage. 116-77-72 for 265” total.   Monday, August 1 View Page 2118 Barron at day 19 with a 61 inch circumference. The 1911 Chan (North) is day 20 and an unimpressive 42 inches in circumference and not photo-worthy. There has been a lot of time and work on our property this year including the pumpkin patch, now we can sit back a little, water and feed and go golfing.   Sunday, August 7 View Page This photo is for Andy H in Nova Scotia to show what is happening to the last few secondaries on our 1911 (North) Chan plant. With a hungry 26 day old pumpkin on the main vine, this plant is shutting itself down. Yes, a mild dose of Calcium Nitrate might be in order and I’ll likely throw some in with the next feeding along with the usual dose of Ureamate. Once a plant either shuts down on its own, or you’ve terminated all secondaries, the likelihood of addition second or third stage growth is unlikely. Ive never had tertiary vines pop up on me, but I’m also fastidious about nipping tertiary vines and unneeded flowers once I’ve got fruit set.   Sunday, August 7 View Page This photo also to show Andy H the other spectrum of what some plants will do. This is the last secondary on one side of the 1911 (south) plant that I’ve allowed a few tertiary vines to grow to fill in an area that’s free. My point is, unless you’ve got active growing tips or hastily trimmed secondaries or tertiary vines, the likelihood of new vines or 3rd stage growth popping up is unlikely and any deviation from your feeding program could bugger things up. Stay the course and keep the current plant and leaves healthy.   Tuesday, August 9 View Page Good thing we pushed this one forward and re-adjusted the vine early, but alas I think this fruit just wanted to be a bum-over like it’s sister over on the Mainland of Vancouver, in Richmond Dave’s patch. Will get an OTT now, but in all fairness…where would you measure the circumference of this pumpkin? No wonder these shaped pumpkins tend to go heavy, plus I’m still stuck on the 2005 Estimation Charts.   Tuesday, August 9 View Page 300-ish inches OTT and has gained 165 lbs for the week, not setting it on fire, but a solid 23.5 lbs per day. As Porkchop pointed out in the discussion board, the pumpkins grow on a trajectory that is pretty predictable when you’ve grown for a number of years. For us, this pumpkin has peaked and is on the down trajectory, today is day 47. We try and now pay attention to keeping the plant as happy and healthy as we can to maintain a slow and steady downward trajectory of weight gain. Next week when we measure, I would expect the daily growth average to be down to 18-19 lbs per day….and so on for the weeks going forward.   Friday, August 12 View Page Day 30 for the 2118 Barron and despite some early setbacks, we’ve got a 30 day PB at 107-73-69 OTT. Yeah, not massive for the benchmarks, but we have only broken 100 inches in circumference a few times and it almost always ends with a good second or 3rd place ribbon (yeah because of Spambie and Richmond Dave) or they blow up real good!!   Friday, August 12 View Page 1911 Chan (south) is day 50 today at 309 inches OTT. Plant is still growing a few secondaries on each side and some tertiary vines to fill in open areas. The bum-over continues, sure glad we lifted vines and cut back necessary tap roots early on, to allow this pumpkins vine room to move up and back, otherwise this fruit would have had stem stress to the max.   Sunday, August 14 View Page The 2118 Barron became suddenly worthy of a shade/rain hooptie cover. 210 lbs gained for the week, so a respectable 30 lbs per day for now. Under the blue cover is the 2118 Barron and the black cover is 1911 Chan (south). We do 1/2 covers to allow for air flow, easy inspection and the once a week measurements, also keeps everything dry.   Tuesday, August 16 View Page Pulling into the Marina below us is the M5 sailboat owned by oil magnate Rodney Lewis of Texas. A 75 metre sailboat, it fit in the Marina at the end pier, usually reserved for our military, fisheries, RCMP and law enforcement boats, quite a sight.   Thursday, August 18 View Page So either wrong on the growth trajectory chart or wrong with measuring this blob, Day 56 and the 1911 Chan/south s cruising along at 30 lbs per day for the last 6 days.   Thursday, August 18 View Page In the foreground with no rain or shade cover (yet) is the 1911 Chan/North that is the plant that just won’t quit, won’t stop and keeps surprising me. Only day 37 and has now decided to join the party and start putting on some inches around the middle gaining 27 lbs per day for the past week. I’ll measure again in a few days to see if the daily gains are ramping up, which I suspect. Under the blue cover s the 2118 Barron and it’s the dark horse in the race at only day 36, but is leading the pack when in comes to daily weigh gains at 38 lbs per day for the last 6 days. Then, the day 56 Chan/South has settled into 30 lbs per day also for the last 6 days.   Sunday, August 21 View Page 1911 Chan/North hit the day 40 mark today and is still not sun/shade house worthy yet, but we will put something up before the September/October rains start to hit us. 102-73-68 OTT this pumpkin has only managed 170 lbs in the past 10 days for an unimpressive daily average.   Monday, August 22 View Page Day 60 for the 1911 Chan/South in the front and day 40 for the 2118 Barron in the back. Plants are still filling in, we’ve allowed a bunch of new growth to circle back in and grow over the early growth that yellowed.   Monday, August 22 View Page Custom foam wedges have been loosely fitted to absorb any additional tilting backwards. Day 60 on the 1911 Chan/South and it’s 159-91-88 OTT and gaining. Must have been a mis-measure a few days ago, the growth pattern is definitely on the way down but maintaining about 19 lbs per day.   Monday, August 22 View Page Day 40 for the 2118 Barron and it’s 139-88-83 OTT and Is still growing at about 30 lbs per day. Again with the algorithms, but numbers and patterns don’t lie and this pumpkin has peaked and is slowly going to tail off, hopefully slowly which our 10 day measuring should show.   Thursday, August 25 View Page 1911 Chan/South getting a larger sun/water protection hut installed today, when will I learn that “some is better none, more is better than less” also applies to the size of the rain/sun protection huts in the years going forward.   Monday, August 29 View Page We have been transitioning from RAW Grow formula to RAW Bloom formula over the past few weeks, and the plants seem to like it.   Monday, August 29 View Page For us, we depend on consistent September weight gains, so we try to keep the front end of our plants as healthy as possible to keep things growing happily. Lots of fresh foliage still rooting and sending a message to the fruit to keep feeding.   Monday, August 29 View Page For us, we depend on consistent September weight gains, so we try to keep the front end of our plants as healthy as possible to keep things growing happily. Lots of fresh foliage still rooting and sending a message to the fruit to keep feeding.   Tuesday, September 6 View Page Pictured here is the 2118 Barron that is up 158 lbs for the week or 22.5 lbs per day while the 1911 Chan is up 137 lbs for the week for an average of 19.5 lbs per day. It has cooled off overnight considerably and the day time highs are much lower now also. I’m cutting back on watering since there won’t be nearly as much evaporative cooling or evaporation from the soil happening as quickly as in July and August. The 1911 Chan fruit will be harvested first and will be at day 100 on October 1st.   Tuesday, September 6 View Page It’s hard to get a good photo of the 1911 Chan/South under its hut, but you can see the foam we installed on the sand is squished, covered and almost buried now. Over 180 inches in circumference now and doing its best to keep growing. 408 inches OTT is our personal best, this one might get close in the end.   Saturday, September 10 View Page Amazing multi-head sunflowers that have been being harvested for the past 4 weeks. Packaged seeds by West Coast Seeds, bought at a local retailer. We never expected them to be this spectacular, but then again they are in “the pumpkin zone” and benefit from special care and attention.   Saturday, September 10 View Page I had been ignoring the 1911 Chan/North only because it has been underperforming compared to its patchmate. Go figure, it’s our largest plant with the fruit at 18 feet on the main and super health secondary leaves as we head into September. I only noticed that this pumpkin was still growing because it needed more sand underneath and it was getting wet on one side where it has outgrown its hooptiehut water shelter. Porch pumpkin in size (under 1000 lbs) but will look great somewhere carved for Halloween.   Saturday, September 10 View Page This is the healthy growth I’m referring to in the earlier post. Pictured here are the last few secondaries on one side of the 1911 Chan/North, amazing green, fresh leaves but I’m afraid the last 10 days growth has only managed 120 lbs in gains, so 12 lbs a day is what it is. This will be last pumpkin harvested in the patch and can stay as long as it continues to grow. I’m looking at the calendar and booking my dates, Vancouver BC and a Weighoff in Washington State are likely and on my current radar.   Friday, September 16 View Page Nice sunny day, took the blanket off and folded back the roof for a quick photo of the 2118 Barron. 10 day growth figures on both the bigger pumpkins have slumped off a little, but the 2118 Barron is up an average of 9 lbs a day for the past 10 days and the 1911 Chan/South is up a mere 40 lbs for that same 10 day period or around 4 lbs per day. Harvest time is soon!!   Friday, September 16 View Page 1911 Chan/South, can’t decide between orange, yellow, green and now some cantaloupe brown. Keeps putting on the inches, but will likely get harvested and delivered to a friends businesses for a guess the weight contest/giveaway. I’ll pick it back up on my way to Krause Berry Farm for the Weighoff and official weight.   Wednesday, September 21 View Page I was having a great chat with Richmond Dave, and sent him this photo of the 1911 Chan/North pumpkin and realized that all 3 of our plants this year are about 30% senescence (leaves dead/done) and about 70% fresh. Now that I’ve taken off the hoophouse, the pumpkin is a bit bigger than I thought.   Wednesday, September 21 View Page 1911 Chan (south) on the left with 2118 Barron uphill right. I was about to take down the rain/water protection, but Andrea pointed out we finally have a little rain in the forecast, so I’ll button them up after photo time. I think the 1911 will give me a PB, so I also gotta figure Andrea’s 2118 pumpkin will surely get her a PB also.   Wednesday, September 21 View Page 1911 Chan (North) day 71 chugging away at 6.5 lbs a day for the past week, 2118 Barron is at day 70 and also slowed to 8 lbs per day for the past 5 days and at day 90 the 1911 Chan (south) surprised us both by maintaining 10 lbs per day last 5 days. Cover and blanket back on!   Thursday, September 22 View Page Anybody know definitively what this is? It was a freeby in our compost. What squash variety is it?   Sunday, October 2 View Page Harvest time, but now we are kinda unsure what we are going to do with our pumpkins. Golfing got in the way again this year and we didn’t plan out our Weighoff schedule early enough and now I’m not sure it’s worth the time, effort and expense to travel all the way to Vancouver for a ribbon. Re-evaluation time, and time for more golf.   Monday, October 3 View Page Yeah sure, of course we want more ribbons!! One pumpkin has been lifted and moved to The Old Farm Market for a Guess the Weight Contest. This one (Andrea’s 2118 Barron) is ready to be lifted and loaded any day now. We are taking advantage of this unseasonably warm and dry weather to prep the patch and garden for the cover crop.   Monday, October 3 View Page Ready to lift. Nice to finally get a stem side photo. 2118 Barron.   Monday, October 3 View Page 1911 Chan stopped off at Arbutus Ridge Golf Club and the Satellite Bar and Grille before being delivered to The Old Farm Market. All 3 of our pumpkins managed quite a bit of orange, so we are pleased about that.   Wednesday, October 5 View Page Great idea from pumpkinpal2 for protecting the pumpkin when lifting and loading. In the past, the straps on my lifting ring would dig in and damage the pumpkins, but that should no happen no longer with these added foam pipe insulators. Thanks again EG, great idea.   Wednesday, October 5 View Page 2118 Barron is loaded and ready, Vancouver here we come.   Saturday, October 8 View Page Another great Weighoff in British Columbia, 7 pumpkins over 1000 lbs. Our pumpkins all went light to the chart this year, not sure what is missing from the program but likely just not watering enough as we have always been on the conservative side of fertilizer and water. 2118 Barron seed was 1086 lbs, 1911 Chan seed was 1010 lbs and the other 1911 Chan seed went 616 lbs.   Sunday, October 9 View Page Delivered all 3 pumpkins to The Old Farm Market for display in the Victoria store, Duncan store and the new Courtenay store. Always a pleasure to help out my buddy Lorne and supply him with giant pumpkins but somehow we gotta get the Vancouver Island Weighoff back up and running. $1500 for the winner, $1000 for second and $750 for third and we had to cancel because we were the only potential entries. On the left is 1086 Dixon, 616 Dixon in the middle and and 1010 Dixon on the right.   Monday, October 10 View Page Andrea and I weeded and raked the entire pumpkin patch and vegetable garden by hand today and then threw down a full sack of fall rye seeds to get the cover crop going. We also took several soil samples, from several different areas within the entire growing area and will get those sent off for testing soon. I usually throw down some balanced granular fertilizer and some calcium nitrate to kickstart the cover crop, but always take the soil sample first so we don’t get a false test result.   Saturday, October 22 View Page The weather has been unusually warm and dry with the first rain in almost 3 months just today. We were lucky to get the cover crop in earlier this year, and as a result we have a great start with the fall rye cover crop already.   Monday, October 31 View Page Happy Halloween everyone. Here are a few small prizewinners with some regular field pumpkins.   Thursday, November 17 View Page One more picture of the great cover crop success we had this year with amazing October weather. You can see, even the grass outside the pumpkin patch has not greened up yet, it’s been that dry and now winter is gonna set in. Looking forward to mowing this cover crop a few times before we till it in. Happy “off season” everyone.