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President - GPC

BP Mates,

I have several ideas to send to our madamoiselle in France, but am interested in hearing your remarks prior to sending her an email......

She writes:

Hello Mr. Wizard. I am an avid pumpkin enthusiast, and though we have a small garden in a village in France, I just harvested 10 of the most beautiful medium size pumpkins ever. I nurtured them with lots of love and fish food(kelp). I am a pre-school teacher/singer/entertainer and have tried for two years with care to start a pumpkin patch at our school in Basel, Switzerland. The vines come, the flowers come, the bees come, but the pumpkins don't. I even transplanted one of my medium sized pumpkins to the Switzerland pumpkinless patch but it remained the same size. What am I doing wrong? The children and I would be very happy if we could receive giant pumpkin seeds from you so that we can try our luck again next year. We will not give up. Thank you so much,

madamoiselle

10/19/2006 2:09:11 PM

You might try posting this in the European section,,,,but then again I would think that it will get read here as well...lol

10/19/2006 2:20:03 PM

Coventry R.I.

wiz, i,d be glad to give them some of my seeds for the children, will be cutting them open after hollloween frank4

10/19/2006 2:48:52 PM

President - GPC

I have offered her some help. What I have gleamed so far is perhaps too many on one plant, she is at around 750 ' elevation close to the Switzerland border. I asked several more questions regarding any fertilizer used, plant size, Im thinking her genetics are for pepo's also. Ill see the response and post it too. This is fun, I love to help, and have people from several different countrys asking for seeds due to the way my daughter set up the config on our website. Way cool, I love to help out.
Grow em big

10/19/2006 3:31:49 PM

Thornhill, Ontario, Canada

There are experienced growers in France, right? Maybe we should put her in contact with them. The German growers are probably not too far away either. If my French was what it used to be, I'd ask for her email.

But, what I really want to talk to her about is the stunning win of "Rebelle" in the annual alpine cow fighting championships (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cow_fighting). It's my new favourite sport after seeing it on one of our French channels about a month and a half ago.

10/19/2006 3:48:11 PM

President - GPC

Frank4

Thanks for the offer, Im thinkin of sending more than one type of seeds to the people who request and I still have some from Dan and Wayne, If my MrReiss is light on seeds then I will request for help, right now I have over 40 people signed up for seeds and climbing every day.....Cool eh?

10/19/2006 3:49:41 PM

President - GPC

Yo Crammed!!! LMAO,, I left name out to see if one of my friends was jokin with me.....well see.....Cow fighting???

10/19/2006 3:51:19 PM

Thornhill, Ontario, Canada

Well, I was going to say that if she was going by "madamoiselle" and not "madame" that may mean she's single. But, that wasn't why I would have wanted to chat in French with her :-)

Yes, cow fighting. It's not like bull fighting. In this competition, the cows fight each other. I'm not sure why it was on TV, or why I was so fascinated by it. But, it was great fun to watch. The cows just seem to stand around until their owners point them at each other. And then, BAM! Whoever runs away loses.

I'll bet you could raise that particular breed of cow in Colorado. It's kind of like the Alps there, isn't it? And, we know that there are already cows in South Park.

10/19/2006 4:28:04 PM

President - GPC

We have hill cows here, legs are shorter on the inside then on the outside. This is how they climb up the mountains. On flat lands they go in continuous circles.

I put madamoiselle in there not her real name, so she could be a madame. Her latest post posted next. I think the real problem is the genetic strain she was growing, and the number of kins on the vine. We google earthed her address and she appears to have enough room and at 750 '. Cool tool google earth. Wish I had Paps address we could satellite in right on his patch.
Wiz

10/20/2006 9:37:46 AM

President - GPC

SHe writes back:

Thanks so much for the speedy response. I planted the seeds in late May in my garden in France and also at the small patch of ground at our school in Switzerland. I only used fish food for fertilizer. My chief wasn't too keen on manure. Please look at the attached photos. If you look at the background where the children are on the sliding board, you can see how the pumpkin flowers came. The other photos are from my garden in France. Thanks so much for your help and we are psyched about pumpkin seeds.

The kins I see are pepos. so AG's she will get. The childern will love growing the Bigs....
Ill send here some of Peace Waynes donations to me in a week or so once my Rei$$ are dried out. This is a great project diary. Frank4, Ill send her some of yours once our bubbles cross here in a few weeks, if you want when we exchange......This is fun!

10/20/2006 9:46:28 AM