Click on a thumbnail picture below to see the full size version. 140 Entries. Wednesday, January 31 View Page It’s digging the patch time ready for this year’s dreams. This huge pile, believe it or not is exactly one third of the soil for one plant. I think it’s going to take me about 12 days to complete the dig. Seed choice is coming along but we’re still in discussions. All is good and as always in pumpkin growers we are full of optimism. We will probably be changing how we water this year but more on that later. Also for a few years now I have wanted to grow “Something “ for myself but that’s for another post.   Tuesday, February 6 View Page Here we go with the beginning of our line up and this has to be a very hot seed. It’s crossed with the Bears 2520 “ROCK” and at the time, the Cutrupi world’s biggest. Hot,Hot,Hot.   Wednesday, February 7 View Page It’s not much to see apart from 5 posts and a weed killed square. You all know that Stewie and I have no secrets, in fact quite the opposite. So if you go to Tic Toc under giant pumpkin wars you will find loads of “How to “ videos from Stewie. There are some videos on my Tic Toc Ianpaton3 but, as I’m new to it, my digging the patch video got archived. It’s my age!!! You can see another version on my instagram ianpaton2269. There will be loads to follow starting here on my diary. All we ask is that you in turn past this forward to other growers or potential growers.   Tuesday, February 20 View Page Drip tubes are going in which are spaced about 12 inches apart.   Thursday, February 22 View Page As there’s not a lot to see in the patch I thought I would share some photos of my man cave.   Thursday, February 22 View Page I’ve been building a wacky marble machine for years now and still photos don’t really do it justice. I have a 1930’s electric model train that will run outside in a tunnel at the back of the shed.   Thursday, February 22 View Page All my old lures are hung up and some do get the odd trip out to the lake for old times sake.   Thursday, February 22 View Page It’s going to be a very cool place to be.   Thursday, February 22 View Page Many hours of work but worth it.   Thursday, February 22 View Page Six automata will be running the hole marble machine but it’s work in progress.   Thursday, February 29 View Page I’ve always said to Mark that I would really like to grow some field pumpkins. He said I’m has been doing his very best to get my arse in gear. So this is the year there is no going back. He popped in to see us earlier in the week to pick up his GPC awards and brought me two more of his world record seeds. Considering he now only has two seed and he is encouraging me to break his own World and GPC record, it speaks volumes of the man. His whole family is one that I’m proud to have as friends.   Friday, March 15 View Page These are hopefully the five seeds that we want in our parch along with one 2907 clone. Ruben found a few more 1875 seeds and it’s always been good for us. Ruben thinks with our improved growing techniques we can beat the WR. So time will tell.   Monday, March 25 View Page The first seeds went in yesterday for the Spanish weigh off. They are wrapped up in tissue paper and in plastic bags between our 2907 clones.   Thursday, April 18 View Page Finally all of the plants are in and waiting for this time of year has been boring to say the least.   Saturday, April 20 View Page I’ve very quickly knocked up this frame for the solenoids and hopefully we can get it all up and running in the next month or so.   Wednesday, April 24 View Page It’s looking like the two early plants for the Spanish weigh off will but be 1727Jacobus’s. I personally think that these seeds are going to be very sort after next year. Of course Stuart and I both think that they can get a WR, if we didn’t it wouldn’t be in our patch. Just remember who said this first.   Thursday, May 2 View Page We will probably be going with this 2447 Cutrupi which was part of the plan and we like it when a plan comes together.   Thursday, May 2 View Page And a photo   Thursday, May 2 View Page Hopefully one of these two clones will make it but we do have a couple of 2020Patons at the other end.   Thursday, May 2 View Page The two middle stations will each have a 2365 Wolf.   Friday, May 10 View Page Our clone was not making proper side shoots so we pulled her out and will be going with our 2020 which is exciting because the seed has loads of potential. The roots were looking pretty healthy.   Thursday, May 23 View Page All the plants are looking bang on   Thursday, May 23 View Page We’re just working out where to send the secondaries and every plant is different.   Thursday, May 23 View Page The first pollination is done and the second early one will be tomorrow.   Thursday, May 23 View Page Vine burying is as early as possible   Thursday, May 23 View Page The pollinator plants are a great improvement for the patch because we don’t have to worry about burying the male flowers on our main plants.   Thursday, May 23 View Page We’re nearly all plumbed in for our new automatic watering system.   Thursday, May 23 View Page Because our glasshouse is so airtight just four of these pilot lights is enough to push the CO2 up to around 1500ppm   Friday, May 24 View Page Venting before pollination   Friday, May 24 View Page Venting on the day of pollination for 28 days. For those of you who are sharp minded you will wonder why the 30C figure? So if you look closely at the times you will see that it’s 30C from 9pm to 8pm. This is purely to keep the vents shut to keep the CO2 in.   Friday, May 24 View Page The latest soil sample, that has taken way too long to come back is okay. Nitrogen is to high, Boron is to low, HIGH five on getting the Sulphur up to 140 and magnesium is always bloody high. All sortable. But it’s only sortable if you get those soil samples away and learn about YOUR soil. Your most important soil samples are coming right up, just before pollination.   Saturday, May 25 View Page 2447 Cutrupi looking great.   Saturday, May 25 View Page Please don’t cut your tendrils off. It there in the way just crack them.   Saturday, May 25 View Page Our 2020 also looking great   Monday, May 27 View Page Hopefully you can see here that we’re sweeping the secondaries back to make room for all of the extra one’s once the pumpkins are set.   Monday, May 27 View Page If your using CO2 make sure that the doors are closed immediately when you go out of the house.   Monday, May 27 View Page This is the one of the 1727 Jacobus plants. I have just realised that I didn’t actually explain why we put the venting temperature up. So, after many hours of research we dug up from experiments growing cucumbers ideal conditions for cell expansion and cell division. We obviously had to take this information with a pinch of salt but it was really interesting. The experiments found that for the first 10 days after pollination the cucumbers went through cell division and cell expansion. Then for a further 18 days they went through cell expansion only. So, what to do? Well our thoughts are to keep the plants in a “happy place” and we felt that the plants needed the temperatures in my previous posts. It’s all a bit touchy feely but we know it’s working. Please, if there’s something in my diary that’s not explained just ask, Stuart and I prefer to have no secrets as pumpkin growing is hard enough as it is.   Wednesday, May 29 View Page This should answer burying the tendril and how we do it. Check out the root that’s desperate to get down into the soil, and it will. It’s absolutely imperative that you get your vines covered as soon as possible because once that white dot on the top sees too much light it will switch off.   Wednesday, May 29 View Page Sometimes tendrils cane be a little naughty.   Wednesday, May 29 View Page The two early pollinations look good.   Wednesday, May 29 View Page Nice   Wednesday, May 29 View Page This is the time of year when you sort of show your cards when you lay out the material for your pumpkins to slide on. My advice would be to aim for enough room to improve 500lbs on your pb and I wouldn’t ask you to anything that we don’t.   Thursday, May 30 View Page The first two look pollinated.   Thursday, May 30 View Page Is everyone ready to watch us Warping and Bending nature?   Saturday, June 1 View Page So vine burying with the”Paton pot system”. First pinch out the tertiary vines to as near to the growing tip possible. It’s important to nip these out early so that the cut is as small as possible and also give it a day to heal up. It’s all about mot giving disease and easy access to into the plant. Then apply a pinch of Wow Wallace mycorrhiza and azos.   Saturday, June 1 View Page Then tip up a 3L pot of soaking wet compost over the leaf node.   Saturday, June 1 View Page Pinch the leaf together and mould, or mold if you’re American the compost around the whole node. It’s important to go all the way round because that top root can come will randomly go anywhere.   Saturday, June 1 View Page Then replace the pot. This is to keep moisture in and help keep light out.   Saturday, June 1 View Page Rather annoyingly the main vine on one of the Wolfs slipped back into a hollow from it’s two supporting bamboos. It’s cracked about on third of the way through. It’s not the greatest of plants as it’s missing lots of secondaries but I did pollinated a nice pumpkin three leaves in front of the crack this morning.   Saturday, June 1 View Page Equally annoying is the first pumpkin that we wanted to pollinate on the Cutrupi shriveled up overnight.   Sunday, June 2 View Page Hopefully you will ger this photo   Sunday, June 2 View Page For those tiny tertiary buds the blunt, not sharp, tip of a knife will make a much better job than pinching them.   Sunday, June 2 View Page Both of the Jacobus plants are fantastic.   Sunday, June 2 View Page This is the other.   Sunday, June 2 View Page One of the Wolf plants looks great.   Sunday, June 2 View Page The other is the worst plant in the patch with loads of secondaries missing   Sunday, June 2 View Page The 2020 Paton is a fabulous plant.   Sunday, June 2 View Page And finally the Cutrupi plant is okay but just okay   Sunday, June 2 View Page A day later than planned my field pumpkins are sown.   Tuesday, June 4 View Page And the photo. Nitrogen is by far the hardest element to get right and it doesn’t always reflect in the size of the leaves. The leaves on this plant have been naturally big just like the 2907. The clear way to tell is by looking at the side vines. If they are running flat on the soil perhaps more Nitrogen is needed and if they are bolt upright you are going to have a problem burying them. Leaf samples really don’t help because they nearly always tell you that they are overdosed with Nitrogen even at the time of sending you feel that the leaves look a bit blue in colour. Personally the way to go is to experiment and build up a picture in your head for yourself. We always use Calcium Nitrate because we always want to improve on the Calcium. It always goes through the drip tube and we expect to see a change within 24hrs We normally put on about 10 ozs per patch but I would drop that down to 5 ozs until you can work out what works for your soil. Remember, you can’t take it off.   Tuesday, June 4 View Page One very nice flower about to open on the 2020   Tuesday, June 4 View Page All the pollinators got pulled out today which is a great time to check the roots.   Tuesday, June 4 View Page I’m doing a great job forgetting to add photos.   Tuesday, June 4 View Page Really clean hands are needed for the twice a day repositioning. We just lift them up and use the weight of the pumpkins to strengthen them out.   Tuesday, June 4 View Page 50 tonnes of second hand peat for four very lucky field pumpkins.   Wednesday, June 5 View Page Hopefully you can see here that we’ve moved the drip tubes away from the main crown. All of the roots from the crown have probably developed so at this point there is no need to water it. Now is the time to keep this part of the plant as dry as possible. If you grow outside cover it with anything, just don’t let water anywhere near it.   Thursday, June 6 View Page The FP seeds are being very stubborn to germinate so I’ve put everything left in the seed box in the airing cupboard.   Thursday, June 6 View Page Early days   Thursday, June 6 View Page I’ve rarely get excited at this stage but this pumpkin is extremely big for the pollination date.   Saturday, June 8 View Page God these are stubborn seeds to germinate.   Saturday, June 8 View Page Not a bad shape and I think the Wolf is pollinated   Saturday, June 8 View Page Pollinated a day later the 2447 should also be pollinated.   Saturday, June 8 View Page The 2020 is way bigger than the last two and pollinated after both of them. After mulling over last year my conclusion is this. We had 4 pumpkins on world record pace and probably growing faster than any fruit has ever grown. These split, which was probably down to a watering issue. The other two were naturally slower growing and we lost them to natural causes. So, for this year we will be changing the watering system but it’s still extremely difficult to calculate how much to water. Will we be playing it safe and slowing them down? In a word, NO   Monday, June 10 View Page This is exactly what we’re looking for.   Tuesday, June 11 View Page Me and my photos.   Wednesday, June 12 View Page The Jacobus hit DAP20 today and is slow for us at 77lbs but obviously very early days. Also when trying to lift her to reposition she’s a lump   Wednesday, June 12 View Page We’re taking to pots off the vines we can reach on the crown end and gently brushing the peat away. You can see the top and bottom roots nicely developed.   Thursday, June 13 View Page The other Jacobus DAP 20 was 1inch bigger so around 85lbs. We are definitely going to have a very mixed bunch in the patch this year. Hopefully several will go heavy and for breathtaking size my money would be on the 2020. Thank you Carl for helping out.   Thursday, June 13 View Page Cracking shape   Friday, June 14 View Page Every 7 days we water, by hand over the top of the last week’s growth which is probably around 8 or 9ft. This is extremely important if you’re growing indoors and using drip tubes. We need to keep the area that has just been buried moist in order to encourage those new roots.   Friday, June 14 View Page The areas that have been buried and rooted need to be nice and relatively dry on the surface. This is to keep disease risk to a minimum. Everything in the photo are added to the hand watering. Basically are the good stuff.   Saturday, June 15 View Page All drip tube systems need a filter and be sure to clean them regularly.   Saturday, June 15 View Page Here’s a great tip. Put the dam knife in the bucket every time you use it. Last year I lost at least three.   Saturday, June 15 View Page So a quick update on the plants. The first Jacobus is a great compact plant.   Saturday, June 15 View Page The second Jacobus is almost a twin and looks great.   Saturday, June 15 View Page The first Wolf is a great plant with a great looking pumpkin but more about that later.   Saturday, June 15 View Page The second Wolf plant is right up there with the worst plants we have ever had to deal with. I could tell you whats wrong with it but wouldn’t know where to start.   Saturday, June 15 View Page The Cutrupi is an okay plant but the pumpkin looks slow at the moment.   Saturday, June 15 View Page The 2020 Paton is a great plant and the pumpkin looks tremendous at the moment.   Saturday, June 15 View Page I have a time lapse camera on two of the pumpkins for the first time this year. If I can work them out the films will go on my Instagram “ianpaton2269” and TikTok “ianpaton3” Stuart is doing a totally everything How To on his TikTok “Giant.Pumpkin.Wars”   Sunday, June 16 View Page Jacobus   Sunday, June 16 View Page A very nice Wolf   Sunday, June 16 View Page Finally the FP’s are in except one that Mark is possibly bringing over for me. In a bid to keep a little more heat in at night I was forced to make some hoop houses. So cold at night   Monday, June 17 View Page The Wolf on the good plant has all the hallmarks of a great pumpkin with the added bonus of colour.   Monday, June 17 View Page The Cutrupi photo does this pumpkin a favour because it’s not a great shape at the moment. I’ve already had one week on my own looking after the patch and now as Stuart got married I have another two. If I’m totally honest looking after 6 plants is just too much as the first three days has been 5 hours in the patch each day.   Thursday, June 20 View Page I really don’t know how we have overlooked this but it will be a major improvement for next year. Because the 2907 clones weren’t behaving we went for the first time ever with the 2020 back up plant running from the centre towards the side. Stuart found roots from the plant way,way back into the Cutrupi plant. It’s just one of those light bulb moments.   Thursday, June 20 View Page You will probably get another photo of this Wolf in the next few days but I thought you would like to see this absolutely stunning pumpkin. Super happy.   Thursday, June 20 View Page The 2020 is also a fantastic looking pumpkin but without the colour. This one will probably light up the OTT chart like a Christmas tree. I might be wrong but I have no intention of doing a sneaky measure. It was twice the size as all the other pumpkins even at pollination.   Saturday, June 22 View Page DAP30 the first Jacbus is 449lbs averaging 53 lbs a day for the last 10 days   Saturday, June 22 View Page And the photo   Saturday, June 22 View Page DAP 20 the Wolf is 108lbs which is about 30% faster than the Jacobus   Sunday, June 23 View Page Well done for Spudder for spotting my deliberate mistake, it’s my age. The other Jacobus is almost identical in shape and weight to its twin and DAP 30 is 444lbs averaging 36 pounds a day for the last ten. One has colour the other is white.   Sunday, June 23 View Page The Cutrupi has improved in shape but this is the last time we will see her blossom for a while. At DAP20 she is 154 inches and not really on the chart.   Sunday, June 23 View Page From the top she looks alright.   Sunday, June 23 View Page It’s been a particularly brutal 6 hours in the patch today but at least the two Jacobus plants are on their way to filling out the patch. I’ve finally got the automatic watering system figured out and it’s working well. Instead of getting 50 gallons three times a day we can now give each plant 30 gallons four times a day. The system is extremely accurate so we might even end up watering more often but this is a good start.   Sunday, June 23 View Page Tomorrow at DAP20 the 2020 will blow your minds.   Sunday, June 23 View Page I’m very proud of the plants   Monday, June 24 View Page DAP 20 the 2020 is 200lbs which is great news as the 2907 was 188lbs.   Saturday, June 29 View Page I didn’t want to post this last week because I didn’t want to spoil Stuart’s honeymoon. About 5 days ago I found this crack that had gone side to side on the orange Jacobus. I put an airline on it and it is absolutely fine. The real problem is, if I’m honest, is dealing the difficulty of the stress it causes us growers.   Saturday, June 29 View Page The Wolf was a very nice surprise and at DAP20 is 140lbs. Absolutely no chance of stopping her growing over the blossom end but very happy.   Saturday, June 29 View Page We’re in the “funny 30 days” now when the pumpkins will be growing at their fastest and it can go Pete Tong at any moment. To try and elevate this we set up the automatic watering which has been difficult but the end result is well worth it. So in the photos peruse your eyes over this scrappy bit of paper. In this period of pumpkin growth last year we were giving each plant a 50 gallon drum of water 3 times a day. If you look at the picture,on the bottom line,we are giving in gallons these figures. (The line above is litres) Now this does vary but this is because in some of the patches the drip tubes are shorter. So on the old system we would have been giving more water per Meter squared on the small drip tube patches. All of this also has the advantage of watering 5 times a day. So, fairly confusing but it’s what we do.   Saturday, June 29 View Page This was a first for me and I had to get some of our staff to help. The White Jacobus was growing back on its stem so we winched the pumpkin forward and it worked okay.   Tuesday, July 2 View Page The touch paper in the patch is well and truly lit. DAP40 the first Jacobus is 970lbs and averaged 52lbs a day for the last ten. The crack is callusing over and as long as the growth rate continues we know the it hasn’t gone into the cavity. Fingers crossed. Not a bad looking pumpkin as well which is always a bonus.   Tuesday, July 2 View Page The first Wolf is still looking like she will be a stunning pumpkin. I’m not sure if we have left quite enough space and she will grow over the top of a thin side vine but it’s probably not a problem. DAP30 she’s 469lbs and averaged 36lbs a day for the last ten.   Tuesday, July 2 View Page The field pumpkins look okay and are just getting going.   Tuesday, July 2 View Page It’s really important not to let any of the vines touch the side of the pumpkin because they tend to infect them so some soft plastic works well.   Tuesday, July 2 View Page Happy with the plants.   Tuesday, July 2 View Page Over the next week I’m going to run through our P&D starting with powdery mildew. I’m starting with this as we have had a small battle with PM that was carried over from the clones that were over wintered. Systhane is our go to chemical but has just been taken off the dam market. It will pucker up the leaves but needs must.   Tuesday, July 2 View Page We also useAQ10 which is a Bio fungicide. It’s a natural occurring hyperparasitic fungus. It’s we worth spraying all of your polythene or glass structures as well as the plants.   Wednesday, July 3 View Page Another good day in the patch. DAP40 the second Jacobus is 963lbs and averaged 35lbs a day for the last 10days.   Wednesday, July 3 View Page The Cutrupi did better than expected and DAP30 is 420lbs averaging 35lbs a day for the last 10 days.   Wednesday, July 3 View Page And the inevitable, forgot to load a photo. She’s not going to be a pretty pumpkin that’s for sure.   Wednesday, July 3 View Page White fly will be common in protected cropping and very simple to control with encarsia and eretmocerus mixed on hanging cards. The encarsia with not be able to tackle the bremisia tabaci white fly but eretmocerus probably will. It’s extremely important with IPM (integrated pest management) to make sure that your friendly control measures are not damaged by any chemical controls. It’s also essential that you apply your friendly controls before you see the problem as they are rarely able to keep up.   Wednesday, July 3 View Page Scarid is a real problem in protected cropping and spraying with chemicals will not cut the mustard. As with all friendly controls it’s wise to go in with at least two modes of action. Both of the following are equally as good so I will start with atheta beetles. These are extremely aggressive and move quickly around the crop. The other excellent control is nematodes. These need to be watered into the crop and they attack the larva. When you put these on you need to use overhead systems removing any filter. They will block up your drip systems.   Thursday, July 4 View Page DAP30 and the 2020 is 700lbs which, to be honest is quite ridiculous. She’s averaged 50lbs a day for the last 10 and looking good.   Saturday, July 6 View Page Red spider control is easy but I get plenty of growers mailing me photos with a nutrient deficiency and it’s RSM. We put phytoseiulus every week and this is important because you want to be building a population of these tiny mites. And tiny mites mean that you have to take your time to put them on evenly. If you already have a big population of RSM you will have to go in with multiple sprays.   Saturday, July 6 View Page For aphids we have tried to control them with friendly bugs but as soon as they develop wings outside they pour in through the vents. This year we are back to spraying. The only other way round it is to put netting on our vents.   Sunday, July 7 View Page Always a welcome sight. For all of those slightly observant the 2020 is growing the opposite way round and I don’t know why we haven’t done this before. Rather than the crown roots hitting a concrete wall they can make use of the patch behind them. We did have a quick measure off the 2020 just to see when it hits the 1000lb mark and it appears to have averaged 72lbs a day for the last three.   Tuesday, July 9 View Page DAP30 the smallest Wolf is 439lbs and averaged 30lbs a day for the last 10. It’s not destined to make a huge pumpkin but we fight for every pumpkin in the patch.   Tuesday, July 9 View Page Cleaning gutters on a wet miserable day and at 8m high it’s not for the faint hearted. I did get this rather different photo of the orange Jacobus. If we get either of them to the scales they will be massive.   Tuesday, July 9 View Page The 2020 is a very vigorous plant.   Tuesday, July 9 View Page DAP35 the 2020 is around 1050lbs   Friday, July 12 View Page The first Jacobus is doing okay and DAP50 is 1478lbs averaging 51lbs for the last 10 days.   Friday, July 12 View Page DAP40 the Wolf is 1035lbs and averaged 57lbs a day for the last ten.   Friday, July 12 View Page And a photo.   Friday, July 12 View Page I couldn’t find the latest soil samples but this should give you something to aim for. You want to be taking around half a dozen soil samples from the root zone. Mix these very well and remove any big stones. And that’s it, just send the required amount to your lab. Literally as simple as that.   Saturday, July 13 View Page The second Jacobus DAP50 is 1515lbs and averaged 57lbs for the last ten days. She is a big and imposing pumpkin with no netting at all at the moment so is likely to be huge.   Saturday, July 13 View Page The Cutrupi is sorting of plodding along and DAP40 is 885lbs averaging 46lbs for the last ten days. (Not a big fan of this one but it’s no beauty contest)   Sunday, July 14 View Page DAP20 the 2020 is 1204lbs and there is possibly something wrong with the pumpkin as the last ten day average has dropped to just 50lbs a day   Sunday, July 14 View Page I checked the numbers for the 2020 and found a foot missing so he’s 1311lbs and averaged 61lbs a day for the last 10. Even with the extra pounds I am slightly concerned about this one but there’s plenty in the patch to be grateful for.