I could feel my garden getting away from me in August. I blame the "summer crush" where we Seattle-ites double and triple booked ourselves with end-of-summer activities. All I could manage was collect zucchini, eggplant, tomatoes, Shishitos, and Asian pears. Not exactly a bad problem to have, but really I needed to at least pull a few weeds once in awhile. And not neglect the beans which seems to happen every year as well.
My vines were taking over. I had grown Delicata winter squash before, but not Jack-be-Little pumpkins. I was skeptical if I'd even get one single jack-o-lantern out of the 8 or so starts I planted. They were super stressed so I more or less wrote them off. Boy did they take off! They climbed over everything and anything--my roses, the fence, the echinacea.
My vines were taking over. I had grown Delicata winter squash before, but not Jack-be-Little pumpkins. I was skeptical if I'd even get one single jack-o-lantern out of the 8 or so starts I planted. They were super stressed so I more or less wrote them off. Boy did they take off! They climbed over everything and anything--my roses, the fence, the echinacea.
A crazy mess
I evaluate everything I grow as to whether it's worth growing again. Sometimes I'm willing to wait a year or two before repeating a variety like with tomatoes since there are so many out there to try. With other varieties that fail, I feel the challenge to try again. And for those that do really well and need some refining, like with these oh-so-cute little pumpkins. I'm going to try half the number of starts and a more extensive trellis that keep them from running away from me.
I'm a sucker for these little pumpkins
Finally, this last weekend I decided to pull the plug on the vines. Real estate is scarce in my garden and I needed room for my winter veggie starts. I'm hoping I'm on time getting them into the ground! More on those later...
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