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Northern California Foothills

Reading some recent threads as well as trying to justify to myself growing more plants than I probably should has gotten me thinking about this.

I think their are a lot of "sacred" things in this hobby that don't get questioned much-plant size being one of them. 750-1000ft or somewhere around there is what is recommended.

Do plants really need to be that big?

Most of the people who have small plants (let's say <400 sq ft) are probably growing in less than ideal conditions and/or haven't been in the hobby long so are highly unlikely in the first place to grow a large pumpkin (>1500 pounds).

Captain 97 grew a 1223 pound pumpkin in 290 sq ft this year with his previous best at 636 pounds. With a few more years experience (or even next year) I think it is entirely reasonable to me he could be growing 1800+ pound pumpkins with 290 sq ft plants. Apologies to Captain 97 for including you in my rant if this offends you. I think what you have accomplished this year is an inspiration to growers like myself who grow in less than ideal conditions.

Anyone care to comment? Feel free to criticize me I just wanted to see what others thought.

10/28/2014 11:06:59 PM

Northern California Foothills

Messed up on the title. Should be the word be between to and as.

10/28/2014 11:08:17 PM

Colorado

You can grow a very large fruit on 300/400/500 square ft. But to get maximum size 750 square feet or larger is needed IMO. Prob. so you still have some younger leaves in late season to grow right up till picking time. There was a over 1700 pounder last year on 550/600sq ft.

10/29/2014 12:33:28 AM

British Columbia, Canada

I think Mark grew his 1947.5 on a 500 sq ft plant.

10/29/2014 1:10:36 AM

East Jordan, MI

I think it depends on your weather, soil condition, nutrient schedule and plant health. The leaves don't last forever, and even the roots become less effective as time goes on. The longer you can keep the plant healthy the longer it will pack on the lbs. A larger plant gives you newer leaves and roots to take it to the end.

What I have observed is when we went from 20x20 to 20x25 we increased a couple of hundred lbs. When we increased to 30x30 we increased by 400 more, was that the only difference -- no, but we learn from others as well. The top 10 growers in our area are in the 750 sq ft plus range. The people that are in smaller areas struggle to get 1K, many of them using the same programs and methods.
The best grower in our area has grown near WR, state records, and local records consistently in 30x30.

That being said, there is no "right or wrong". Thinking outside of the box and figuring out what works for you is what it is all about. If you find something that worked for you, don't be afraid to share it. Sharing makes others think. And believe it or not, thinking it good.

10/29/2014 7:15:30 AM

Muddy Waters

exactly as Cecil says.You need the bigger plant to carry the fruit in September.I changed form from 550 sg feet to 750 this season.

10/29/2014 7:49:39 AM

Nottingham, UK

So, with say 750 Sq ft, what would the optimum behind and in front of areas be?

10/29/2014 10:29:56 AM

Northern California Foothills

Thanks for the comments everyone. Having healthy leaves at the end of the season from new growth is definitely a benefit of large plants.

Cntryboy, your breakdown of weight increases is helpful, but it is difficult to determine how much of the weight increase can be attributed to increase in vine size due to the other factors of greater experience coupled with better patch prep, plant maintenance, etc. I appreciate the contribution you have been making in the knowledge thread.

I'm wondering how we settled on this ideal patch size. I think read somewhere that grower in the 90s had much larger plants but then realized the plants more putting too much into vegetative growth.

It be interesting to see how big of a pumpkin a top grower could grow on a small plant. I think the problem is that most people who grow small plants wouldn't be able to grow a very large pumpkin even with the increase in plant size so there is no way of knowing how much of an effect plant size really has.

This is a bit of a tangent but someone posted this article in another thread. http://www.ovgpg.com/documents/articles/ovgpg2-14_2.pdf Beni Meier, Gary Miller, and Tim Mathison each had different pruning strategies with similar results. I think the same could apply for plant size.

10/29/2014 10:57:57 AM

Germany

http://www.bigpumpkins.com/Diary/DiaryViewOne.asp?eid=194903
http://www.bigpumpkins.com/Diary/DiaryViewOne.asp?eid=194904
http://www.bigpumpkins.com/Diary/DiaryViewOne.asp?eid=194905

10/29/2014 1:22:06 PM

Stanwood, Washington

Wow 1800. I don't think that's happening for me at least not in this climate without a greenhouse.

My own thoughts are that what I had was less than Ideal I wasn't able to grow the secondaries out as long as I wanted and get as much plant behind the kin as I wanted. I really think my 1223 was the result of a special seed My other plant grown on 300 sf only went 819.5 pounds.

If we graphed out the increase in Pumpkin weight vs the square footage, I think that the sweet spot on the bell curve would be between 400-500 square feet. That would give you 10'-12.5' secondaries behind the kin and still leave some room in front of the kin for the plant to fill in and back feed late in the year. If we extrapolate the bell curve you would get some added benefit by going above and beyond that but the increase in pumpkin weight would dimminish the larger you go. For instance if you go from 300sf to 500sf you might see a 400 pound increase where as if you went from 500sf to 700sf you might only see a 100 pound increase. and from 700sf to 900 sf you might only see 10-15 pounds. At some point you would get to a point where added square footage is not really adding any significant weight. Ive got no data to back that up and i just pulled those numbers out of thin air but it seems logical.

10/29/2014 1:45:12 PM

Northern California Foothills

Pumpking thanks for providing this information which provides data to back up my idea.

Captain 97- Due to your climate that might not be possible, but if you were in an ideal climate I do not think that is unreasonable. I think subconsciously as growers we tend to focus the most on our best plants so the gap between your 819.5 and 1223 might not be as large as the weights suggest. Also other factors may have played a role such as varying sunlight or soil conditions.

10/29/2014 2:14:07 PM

Colorado

Good stuff pumpking. I suspect patch sizes are driven by copying what size the latest world champion uses.When I got into growing some of the growers were still doing huge plants-1500+.Then xmas tree and 700sq ft. Then 900.Now 800-1200.

10/29/2014 2:44:47 PM

Germany

The idea to spending some time on these graphs arose from the 1723 Marshall which had been grown in a 500 sqft patch and which had been among the biggest/heaviest pumpkins by 2011. Of course, a 800 sqft plant should be more productive than a 400 sqft plant, but with constrained patch size one needs to optimize both the plant size and the number of plants. In case of a 1500 sqft patch and with the decision whether to grow two 750 sqft plants or three 500 sqft plants I would give the latter option a go, because the 500 sqft still serve as a good foundation for fruit growth but the additional plant is an additional insurance that all the effort put into this patch could at least end in a pumpkin for the scales.

10/29/2014 6:49:50 PM

Netherlands

Jörg, if you take that one 1800 lber (950+ sq ft) out of the equation for the 1161 Rodonis (bottom graph), the trend line will become pretty much linear as well. That one pumpkin is causing the trend line to tilt way out of proportion.

There isn't enough data to be conclusive, but your analysis seems to suggest that larger than 950 sq ft will cause a decrease in weight.

I'd say 550-750 sq ft is probably the best size for a plant. This spread will compensate for different growing conditions. Huge pumpkins have been grown on bigger plants than this, but equally on smaller ones. In 2007 I grew the WR squash on 500 sq ft.

10/30/2014 4:28:13 AM

Germany

Brad, your squash is another nice example (I didn´t know that it was grown on 500 sqft as well). Plants larger than 900 or 1000 sqft...well, I don´t think that fruit growth will then decrease, but one important question is how do you get to grow such a large plant. As soon as fruit growth maximizes, there will be less nutrients put into plant growth. Does the larger plant originate from longer plant growth prior to pollination (hence, later pollination, hence a shift of the fruit growth period out of the ideal time frame of long days with much sunshine), or is there a genetic influence as well which made this plant put all effort into vine and leaf growth rather than fruit growth (also, different nutrient levels, such as higher N, could have contributed to the larger plant vs. the slightly smaller fruit). The plant size itself probably isn´t a negative impact on fruit growth, but the parameters which had been supportive of that manner of plant growth.

10/30/2014 5:23:54 AM

Netherlands

That's what I mean Jörg. I don't mean the pumpkin will actually drop in weight, but that the extra square footage of plant is probably taking away more from the pumpkin than it is delivering. If you can keep your plant (leaves) healthy the whole season (and this is possible), I don't see the benefit of growth beyond the 750 sq ft mark.

10/30/2014 11:55:58 AM