Giant Pumpkins, 2004

David McKinney and Daryl Tingley
Maugerville, New Brunswick, Canada

McKinney U-pick Raspberries

The Pumpkin plants: 1 2 3 4 5



May 22, 2004, Planting Day


The "water" supply.


July 5. The Green House comes down and the wind break goes up.


July 5. Several blossoms are pollinated.


July 28: We think the bigest pumpkin is on number 1. There is another not far behind on plant 1, and my photos may be confused. Pumpkin 5 is also getting big, and likely either 1 or 5 will will be the biggest, if we can prevent disaster. There are other pumpkins, but they are difficult to find! We can no longer get between the fence and the pumpkins. (And the fence is very close to a corn row.)

July 22 and 28. Pumpkins are now totally out of control.
Forget the pruning and hope for the best.


August 2 and 5. Climbing the fence


August 10. A pumpkin on number 4 has emerged out of the leaves. It is groing very fast. Number 5 appears to have stopped growing. I dont see any damage, but we had been slowly rotating it, so perhaps broke a stem.
August 15. Number 1 and 4 have OTT measurments of about 260 inches. (Very roughly measured.) (360 lbs according to 2003 tables)
August 25. Number 1 has OTT of 296, number 4 OTT of 288. (Camera has been stolen, so no pictures!)
August 31 Number 1 OTT is 300, number 4 is 292. The other pumpkin on number 1 actually measured 320. But it is very flat, so I doubt it will live up to that weight. Willtake them to the Fredericton Exibition this weekend. Seems little point in waiting for more prestigious fairs.
August 5 Yesterday the two biggest were picked and mooved to the Fredericton Exhibition. It turned out that what I thought was a pumpkin on number 4 was really on 5. I'll move some pictures, but not change the text above. It also turned out that the pumpkin on 5 (formally known as 4) is the biggest weighing in at a better than expected 581.5 lbs. and the one from number 1 558.5. This gave the McKinney-Tingley pumpkin operation first and second place - the next one was a measly 420 (or so) pounds. (Grown by last years winner.) We have one more big one - another from plant 1. It should be about the same weight - 500 lbs +. We may take it to another exhibition. The problem is that it is to wide for the trailer!

The first and second place pumpkins at the Fredericton Exhibition, 2004


Some pictures taken on September 4, as they were moved to the FREX.





September 26 We took the last big pumpkin to Neguac. Glad we did, it weighed 630lbs. Our best. But it was an ugly! (It is the pumkin on plant 1 that was not shaded.) That was the first weigh in we attended. A long but fun day. And we learned a lot. (And found seed sources!) The winning pumpkin was about 1030 lbs - so we have a long way to go.

The two winning pumpkins from the Fredericton Exhibition, now at the City Motel, Fredericton.


The 630 on my front lawn, along with some smaller ones.