Click on a thumbnail picture below to see the full size version. 16 Entries. Wednesday, July 1 View Page First year, first diary here. Here's my patch. Planted seed inside late April, got them in ground mid-May. In front is my 16' AG plant, with 2 smaller AG's growing opposite directions right behind it. In the back right there are 4 Prizewinner Hybrids, growing 2 per hill, opposite directions. Plot was not readied last fall and is located in the only sunny spot on my lot, which happens to be a clover patch (food plot) for deer. I think I'll be lucky to finish one pumpkin. Wednesday, July 1 View Page This is my first year growing, first diary entry. Welcome to my patch. In front is one AG plant with 2 AG's right behind it. In the back I have 4 Prizewinner Hybrids on 2 hills. Got the store bought seeds planted late April inside, and moved outside mid May. Wednesday, July 1 View Page Here are my AG plants. The one on the left (AG1) is 16 feet and as of today has one 3 lober pollenated (6/28) at 12' out and one 5 lober pollented at 14' out today. On the right, there's 2 AG plants paired on one hill. They don't seem to be growing as well as the separte plant, but I'm glad to have them for pollenaters since the big one has few males. They are both about 10-11 feet. Wednesday, July 1 View Page Here are my prizewinners. There are 4 plants here, paired on 2 hills. I squeezed them in and have had to train them around my apple trees. The one at the front has been started to S-turn because there are now two (5 & 6 lobed) females pollenated on the end, behind that last leaf. Wednesday, July 1 View Page my first one...this is a 3-lobe AG pollenated 6/28. Probably won't keep it, unless it seems to grow good. It's at 12' out, and theres another 5 lober just pollenated this morning 14 feet out. Wednesday, July 1 View Page This is a prizewinner female on left pollinated 6/30 and the one on the right opened this morning. I pollinated it, but it is growing under and parallel to the vine. Probably not a good one to keep. Tuesday, July 7 View Page Ducks in a row... this is my biggest AG plant, now topping out around 18-19 feet long. I have 3 females pollinated, left (6/28) 4 lobe at 12', middle (7/1) 5 lobe at 14' and right (7/6) 5 lobe at 17'. In about a week or two I'm gonna get the knife out... Tuesday, July 7 View Page 2 of my earliest prizewinners...pollinated 6/30 and 7/1. They're growing faster than the AG's. Go figure. My other 3 prizewinner plants are just now getting females. One has 2 pollinated open this past weekend while I was away. Tuesday, July 7 View Page my AG plants. One on left, two on right. Learned a couple things here. First, don't put plants on same mound. Second, need more space between plants. Third, it's good to have at least 2 plants. My biggest AG is very thin on males. If I only had 1 plant, I wouldn't have had males to pollinate with. Tuesday, July 7 View Page My prizewinner hybrids went nuts while I was away for the weekend. 2 open pollinations on the front left plant and tremendous secondary growth. Need to give more space next year. Tuesday, July 7 View Page what's this? I suspect slug damage. It's just on the outside, doesn't seem to be a hole through to the inside. I sprayed with a 1:9 bleach/water solution. Sunday, July 12 View Page Lost a total of 7 pumpkins this weekend to deer/rabbits. Tiny bite marks on some, others bit in half. Also lost some secondary vine to deer. Gonna have to remedy that... Tuesday, July 14 View Page Installed 150' of fencing around the patch last night. Picked up "deer barrier" fencing at Home Depot. So far so good. One AG pumpkin is 32" on day 14. One prizewinner going 28" day 13. Keeping up with the giant. Have another AG pumpkin pushing 12-14" but has big bite marks on it. I'm leaving it grow for now, but I think it's gonna be a split. Just pollinated one on that plant a little further out. We'll see if it takes. Monday, July 20 View Page Pulled one of my AG plants yesterday so it doesn't compete with the others. 7 plants in a space big enough for 2 or 3 is not good. Have a good one growing on one plant. This one is 25"cc day 9. The scab is from teeth marks something made on it when it was the size of a tennis ball. I wasn't sure it would heal over, but it's growing nicely. Monday, July 20 View Page my biggest AG so far. It's 44"cc on day 19. Growth has slowed a little, only doing about 2" per day. Trimmed off all males and terminated secondaries on plants yesterday. Have about 10 pumpkins going. Growing some smaller prizewinners for the neices/nephews. Need to get caught up with my vine burying and give it some foliar ferts tonight. Tuesday, July 28 View Page My biggest AG is now at 54"CC day 27 and is 134 OTT (61 lbs). Other AG is bigger for its age, but both are only doing about an inch in circ. per day. It's been really wet, over 3" rain the past few days and powdery mildew is making it's appearance in the patch. Sprayed fungicide last night. One thing I notice from other diaries/pics is my AG's won't be 1000 pounders, not enough plant to support that kinda growth. I'm still shooting for 2-300 though. Maybe???? The Prizewinner pumpkins have shown vigorous growth the past few weeks and I have several pumpkins set. Some are growing very rapidly. Terminated most secondaries (got to get them buried) because they're reaching the limits of the patch.