Since Stuart mentioned about cover crops, so I wanted to include a picture of a cover crop I grew at my patch a couple years ago. This was a mix of rye, peas, and hairy vetch. They can grow pretty tall given time and water. They are very good for your soil.
A horrific site in any patch that will give any grower nightmares! An empty spot where a once growing pumpkin used to be! Say it ain't so!!!
Stuart,Here is a pictures of my friend Vince who grows at my house. He grew the 1610 lieber plant, a very highly planted seed in 2011 with great expectations for big and orange from the pumpkin community. Unfortunately Vince had a beautiful and fast growing pumpkin that went down to rot at day 20! He had just cut off his back up pumpkin and chopped all vines just before this happened. He put a lot of work into this plant with a terrible ending tragedy! This picture was taken a few weeks before he lost his fruit and the top picture shows a recent photo of where his pumpkin was lost on the sand. The plant is no longer alive. Silence please for a few seconds.... I can report some good news that Vince has another plant at his house and the pumpkin looks to be growing well for him there. So at least he won't have a zero year! What a tormenting hobby this can be:)
My personal pumpkin plant has been under constant attack by caterpillars, sow bugs, powdery mildew, and any other creeping thing at my house! lol. Been very hard with all of these attacks. I think I have over 5000 of those sow bugs in my patch. I keep killing them, but they breed like rabbits. I never knew these bugs to be damaging to adult plants, but they have proved me wrong. They bite your vines, leaves, roots, etc. Anyway, been a tough year in the Fredricks patch, we'll see if my plant can survive a little longer and at least give me a pumpkin for Halloween.
Jim Fredricks, San Diego
