Click on a thumbnail picture below to see the full size version. 1 Entries. Friday, April 19 View Page Hi everyone! Introducing ourselves, this will be our 3rd year at growing a giant pumpkin! The first year was a significant learning experience, then the 2nd year we had tons of challenges with ribbon vine but worked hard at it and came up with a 7th place winner! This year we are excited and ready to go! We attended Jay's annual kickoff educational giant pumpkins class March 17th, took lots of notes, bought the heating cable, thermostat controller, and some soil supplements he recommended. Ray performed a soil sample test March 24th that showed deficiencies in all areas except for nitrogen. Ray tilled the garden, then dug out the section where he wants to plant and mixed in phosphorous, potash, overall fertilizer, humic acid, and peat moss. He placed the heat cable 15-17 inches deep, has sanded the seeds we received from Jay (Richard 1043) and plans to start the seeds indoors this weekend.