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Stouffville

Hey Everybody,

I just wanted to start a little discussion dealing with the growth characteristics of the big ones vs the smaller ones. I'm curious whether some of the giants (like >900lbs) obtain very high growth rates or just maintain more reasonable ones for longer periods than smaller pumpkins. For instance I had a fruit back in 1995 which peaked at approximately 27lbs/day for 6 days, after which it only gained at most 16lbs/day. I couldn't link this growth rate reduction to any external factors, since the weather stayed about the same, I was watering consistently and the plant stayed visibly healthy. I basically concluded that genetics was the reason for the slow down...this fruit just didn't want to get huge! It ended up spitting in Sept and reached a weight of 740lbs.

So I'm curious what your max growth rate was for your biggest pumpkin this year or in other years, and how many days it stayed near this rate (say 5-10lbs/day) and what the final outcome of the fruit was.

I'll start: my 700lb UOW pumpkin this year gained 15-20 lbs/day for approximately 25 days. It cracked on a scar from bird damage but was otherwise ok.

Mike

10/28/2003 12:12:10 PM

Spokane, WA

I had a 733 lber. that gained 20-23lbs./day for about 10 days or so. The decreasing growth rate was very gradual however.

10/28/2003 8:05:10 PM

Garden State Pumpkins

My best day for the 402 was 12 lbs stayed mostly in the 5 to six range..matured way early as did all of my fruit this year...gonna rethink the fert program and get some clay back into the leaves. Chuck

10/29/2003 6:27:24 AM

Applegate, Oregon

My 870 had a stretch where it gained 21 lbs/day for 17 straight days and my 805 had a 21 day stretch where it also gained 21 lb/day.

10/29/2003 9:47:21 AM

Key West, FL

My 880 gained around 26 pounds a day for 20 days, which is a lot for this side of the country.

10/29/2003 10:59:56 AM

15 pounds/day for a while = 604.5 pounds

10/29/2003 11:03:20 AM

Wood River, Nebraska

Greatest gain for a 24 hour period = 24.5 lbs. PB 608.
dave

10/29/2003 2:41:00 PM

Mill Bay, British Columbia

21 lbs/day for 1 week = 577.5 pounds

10/29/2003 3:50:49 PM

huntsburg,ohio

240 lbs in 7 days.Steady to the end was still picking up 5 lbs a day at end.Jerry

10/29/2003 9:41:08 PM

Montoursville, PA

Worked up to 25lbs a day for seven days then it fell off the platform that was the prop holding her off her own stem. Measured OTT 710 with thirty days to grow. Took her a week to be rotted pretty bad. Sing with me now...."what might have been" la la la la. :)

10/30/2003 1:14:59 PM

Mastic Beach, New York

highest was 25lbs aday...avg 18 a day

10/30/2003 5:36:54 PM

Stouffville

so what do you guys think is the limiting factor in terms of final size of a fruit? It seems many plants are capable of hitting growth rates of around 25 lbs/day, which I think was what Al Eatons 1153 peaked at if I remember correctly. Getting the growth rate is not the problem but maintaining it seems to be, although to some degree this is probably genetic. Why would a fruit want to stop growing? What would occur in the plant/fruit to make this happen?

10/31/2003 2:04:52 PM