Pumpkin problem, they never grow.

Hello my fellow permies. I live in Adelaide Australia. It's pretty hot and dry in the summer. I have grown pumpkins successfully once or twice. I direct sow seeds in spring and make sure they are fed and watered but they just refuse to grow until late summer when they go crazy. However that's to late to set fruit and ripen. What am I doing wrong. Do you think it's just too hot and I should shade them? Maybe my soil is poor, but I've had success a couple of times so I doubt that is the case.
Thanks in advance,

Alex

Is your nitrogen level to high?  If so you might get lots of plant but not fruit.

C. Letellier wrote:Is your nitrogen level to high?  If so you might get lots of plant but not fruit.

I don't think so, the problem is that it does not grow at all during the summer. Well that's an exaggeration. It grows so slow it seems to be doing nothing all summer. Once it cools down in late summer it grows like mad. I'll try shading next season but we're moving house so it will not be a very good scientific study.

How are you fixed for pollinators? Good supply of bees? I have hand-pollinated pumpkins and squashes before when I didn't see many insects around. It's easy to just take a male flower, rip off the petals (save them for fritters) and swab the anthers on the stigma of one or more female flowers. If you use a different plant you improve your chances.

I think no one is actually reading what I said. The problem is it doesn't grow enough to flower. I'll attach photos of the plants direct sown at least 4 months ago. It's like they just do not grow more than 30cm until summer is over at which time it's impossible to fruit and ripen.

As previously said, you might have too high nitrogen and need more phosphorus and potassium.

This can be achieved with bonemeal, eggshells, seaweed, ashes, and other minerals.

The bone meal may be purchased, though if you would like to make it this will help:

https://permies.com/t/160397/Bone-Meal

You mentioned temperature though what about sun and water?

Once you get the plants blooming then if you are not seeing pollinators you will need to hand pollinate.

I hope some of the things that have been mentioned so far will help.  In the future, you might work on soil health.

https://permies.com/t/15882/add-phosphoros-potassium-calcium-naturally#140040

This thread is one of Dr. Bryant Redhawks great threads so it might help:

https://permies.com/t/67969/quest-super-soil

Hi Alex-
when you say they grow (gorgeous plant, btw) but by then it's too late to flower/set fruit, pardon the dopey question but why? Do you get frost? Do they just die?

I ask because I'm also southern hemisphere (southern Brazil, zone 9b, lots of rain, occasional frost and max temps of maybe 33), and planting any kind of squash/pumpkin/cucurbit has been topsy turvy for me the last few years. I can get spaghetti squash ONLY to grow at the start of the season. Then they all get fungus and die at the same time.
Actual pumpkins are on their own time. I can plant them but they dawdle, are stalled just like yours. Only the crookneck type seem to want to live- all the actual pumpkins, kabocha, etc just shriveled up and died. Right now I am getting crazy harvests (we just crossed into fall) and I still have female flowers setting- it's 15 degrees this morning (early cold snap) and they show no signs of stopping. I usually just let them go as long as they want to.

Garden timing for me lately has been very odd. I can only grow tomatoes in winter, squash in fall, cucumbers in spring... our temps and weather are all over the place. It's a learning process for me.

another thought- i know it's frustrating for me talking to people who don't garden in my part of the world (or the same seasons as me). I don't know where in Australia he's located, but have you seen Mark Valencia of Youtube's Self Sufficient Me? He's got a few videos about growing pumpkins (he only uses raised beds) that might be helpful.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eaBV7ldCU9Q
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=55HzXDnAdc8

Alex,

Are you growing seed from the same source every year? It might help to try landrace seeds or try to develop a landrace variety for your location. Joseph Lofthouse has a lot of information in his book about how he developed his landraces, and how difficult it was the first year. I've been pleased with seeds from https://givinggroundseeds.com/collections/winter-squash and although they are not from your area, this may be a good place to start. If you can find neighbors or other sources in your region that have had success, then that would likely be the best option.

You may not end up with a squash that looks like a classic pumpkin but if you want production and great taste, then the form shouldn't matter too much.

Hi Alex, I'm reading what you're saying, and you seem to have water and nitrogen well covered. I'm assuming you grow other vegetables without problems in the same soil and fertility conditions?

I always thought of the Cucurbit family as liking plenty of heat in order to grow, but I've always lived in temperate zones. Is it possible your summer is just too hot for the plants to grow? Your photo is damn pathetic for a pumpkin plant after the autumn equinox, I'm really sorry.

You might get more useful answers asking your neighbours and friends in your region about their pumpkin growing. I think most of us have run into our pumpkin problems mainly due to insufficient heat or nitrogen, but that doesn't sound like your problems.

It also is a good suggestion to try growing the same variety as your neighbours do successfully. You could even beg some seeds from a successful pumpkin they're eating.

(By the way, to try to clarify confusion, Australians and Indians say "pumpkin" for all winter squash. North Americans have a complicated arrangement of common names for squash, and say "winter squash" for any that are eaten fully mature and can be stored into winter. Only if they are bright orange skinned and cartoon-pumpkin-shaped are they called pumpkins in N. America).

Alex, what is the soil made of? In the photo it looks rocky. I am in southern California and all my squash over many years always get droopy leaves in the heat of the day. But that's not what I'm seeing in the photos. To me it looks more like an underground problem, bugs that chew roots, bad nematodes, something like that. Maybe look into that as a cause.

Hard to tell from your pictures, the varieties we grow need lots of sunshine; at least 8-10 hours.  The vines grow for us with minimal fertility and very high heat, just lots and lots of sun.

Thanks for the tips everyone. I will try again in spring 🤞

After a much closer look at what I'm misidentifying as rocky/gravelly "soil" is bark mulch. This is another possibility of where the problem lies; IF you don't know for certain that it is organic, untreated with anything but mechanical chopping... I've seen bark mulches come in with some nasty stuff lurking. Just another thought I had after viewing from my desktop rather than my cell.


Here is one article about such things:  https://www.oufc.org/2014/06/07/beware-toxic-mulch/

I have a similar problem with mixed success with my squash (all kinds) and I sent photos to a master gardener and they said it was due to a nitrogen deficiency. My soil was pretty poor to start with. I've added tons of compost over the past few years, but she explained that compost is still pretty low N, and using wood chip mulch (even though I'm careful not to mix it in the soil) ties up some N as well.

I haven't started my squash yet this year, but everything has been growing much better since I started adding Alfalfa meal to the planting holes.