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KENTUCKY

My Davies fruit has major problem. Big time rookie mistake here. The top shoulders are growing (drooping) over the stem and vine. Not touching vine yet. It is forcing my vine into the ground. Have dug trench into ground to help, and last night tried to jack up fruit and raised front only about 2 inches, (looked at docgipe's dailry for ideas, thanks docgipe) the growth last night put it back into same stressful position.
What other ideas could you suggest to help in this matter. How important is vine after fruit? Should I cut vine after fruit to at least help 1/2 of problem. Any ideas will be very greatful.

P.S. I have all my eggs in 1 basket now. This is my only fruit left for the year. She is going good at 30 days, today cc is 116 inches, she estimates at 369 or 374 depending on chart using. By far my PB and I don't want to looose it to a snapped vine.

Thanks for any help,
Mike

8/20/2003 7:29:28 AM

Ga.

Mike,,would it relieve stress on fruit if you tilted rear up/foward by putting a board under rear of fruit??

8/20/2003 7:40:28 AM

KENTUCKY

no jeff it wouldn't, That's the problem,I'm not a good explainer, the blossom end is comming up, as the stem end is going down toward the ground.
Thanks,
Mike

8/20/2003 8:12:06 AM

Western Pa.

I have found that gently putting chunks of styrafoam between the vine and pumpkin will help for a while. Too much stress, and the vine will tear off of the stem.

8/20/2003 8:58:12 AM

Garden State Pumpkins

Mike...Can you loosen up more vine free up more roots...and styrofoam it up higher so the stem isn't tugged down so much...better to save the fruit then worry about leaf count later...

8/20/2003 9:28:34 AM

Circleville Ohio USA

I have grown a 600 pound pumpkin on top of its vine with the stem completly out of view. The blossom end was pointing toward the sky.

8/20/2003 11:53:10 AM

Tacoma, WA

We call those "bird bath" pumpkins! :>)

Stan

8/20/2003 5:18:50 PM

Syracuse, NY

my 508-pounder last year was actually growing on the end of the main vine, as i had to cut the main off because it and the other little secondary that was growing off of the stem
were going to be grown on top of and ruin the stem on this
then 150-or-so-pounder....so, yes, you can remove the main vine after the fruit and it will be fine, at least in MY experience, from 150 to 508 pounds, that was okay with me!
you might just have to literally dig around and underneath the fruit here---ultimately you would lift the pumpkin off the ground about 2 inches, scrape away about
6 inches' worth of the soil, leaving only the soil that is at the front/stem end of the fruit. once you were to set it back down, the fruit would be now rocked back about 15-20 degrees from level, the stem end would now be visible and happy and you'd still have a new PB! okay, this is all fantasy, i haven't tried it, but the end result would be the same--if you dig under the fruit even 1/2 way from the blossom to the stem, and applied gentle, large-area pressure to the top of the blossom end of the fruit,it would also rock back, your friend would put a piece of thin, rounded-edge board under the front of the fruit, and then you'd let 'er down easy! either weigh, i think digging
under the fruit is the first step--as well as severing all the secondary roots for like 5 feet both ways--don't worry about squishing the roots-=--you've got bigger fish to fr...
err, i mean, fruit to move! good luck...'pal

8/20/2003 7:37:45 PM

Syracuse, NY

by the weigh, don't worry too much about the water leaking out of the vine where you cut it, if that becomes necesary. it Will drip, drip, drip for literally a couple of days, but whenever i've had to do it, it stops eventually.....'pal

8/20/2003 7:40:44 PM