Hi everyone. I'm new here, living in Melbourne, Australia, and loving this board. I have a specific question about growing pumpkins from whole pumpkins I've bought from the market. I know that pumpkins can germinate in the compost heap by accident from discarded seeds, so I'm assuming I can grow pumpkins from ones I bought for food. Does anyone know of the best way to treat the seeds for germination in seedling mix? Should I just pop them into my beds and hope for the best? Any secrets I should know about? Cheers martinpribble
Hiya Martin The method I was taught was to create a composty soil mound and plant 3 to 4 seeds spaced. Do this in an area where the vines can run. They will need water and sun. So here is a chance to bucket some grey water if the rains don't come. You will also need to wait till about Melbourne cup day to plant. getting a bit cold now :) Liz (Dandenongs)
Thanks Liz. Will I be able to keep seeds I've collected recently until then, or should I get hold of a pumpkin closer to November?
No now is when you collect from ripe pumpkin. Try and go for the ones that look even orange through the flesh. Put them on a saucer on a bit of kitchen paper to dry out then store them in a safe place. Make sure they are dry or they will get mould. Roughly what area are we looking at re soil? Liz
well, I've never grown pumpkins before, so I'm a bit of a noob to the whole thing. We only have a couple of spots that I would be comfortable growing a rambling pumpkin plant, but I'd like to try out a couple of types, like QLD Blue and maybe Butternut. But I'm also intrigued by the smaller dark orange kind (don't know the name, just got it from queen vic on Sunday). This one is about the size of a softball and can be baked whole, and has a few grey warty bumps on the skin. BTW we live in Coburg.
Just looked at a map and seems you are on a volcanic based soil. If it is, work it up with some compost/maure if you can. Do the same for clay. http://www.dse.vic.gov.au/dpi/vro/maps.nsf/pages/Victoria-private-forest-vic_lsys?Opendocument You could also plant them in a box either an old machine box with bottom out or make a square about 40 cm high let it trail over the edge and as it grows encourage it to go where you want it. tyre tower is another option. You could build a stick , trellis something or other for it to climb on to go along a fence. As the pupkins grow if they are not too big they will hang on if they get heavy create a sling out of pantyhose or onion bag for them. (Need to be a bit creative here if you have limited space. This is of course assuming they take off. :) Do you have any good Italian vegetable gardeners nearby to ask how they run their veggie gardens. Re the small one you like from Vic. Market give it a go. Save the seed and see what happens. You can start the seed in one of those seed pots first and then carefully transplant to location. Cucumbers are easy to grow as well. The can be trained up a rose arch or a trellis or just a ladder. If you look up google for planting instructions make sure you restrict it to Australian conditions. Burk's backyard and the ABC gardening show are good info sources. Will be interested to see how you go.
Thanks heaps for all the info Liz. I'll give it a go and let you know how it went. We actually have really good topsoil here in Coburg, about 70cm of it on top of black volcanic clay. This property used to have a horse on it, used for milk deliveries back in the early 1900's, so I'm assumimg that the soil quality might have something to do with that. Apparently about 5m under that is solid basalt, not that we're going to be digging that deep any day. ;)
Hi martinpribble i live south of sydney and last year had a lot of success with waltham butter nuts, i planted some seeds from a pumpkin brought in a shop the plant grew ok but pumpkins never formed, the reason being they where hybrids, i would recommend you buy a packet of seeds to be on the safe side cheers Brian
thanks brian, I'll keep that in mind, but part of my reasoning is that I want to avoid buying seeds if I can. Call it an experiment i've been trying on a few species around the place. In the long term my main objective would be to swap seeds with neighbours and avoid buying seeds altogether. Sounds a bit hippyish and new-age, but I'm reall approaching this whole thing from a scientific perspective.
