The Pumpkin Plant - November 3, 2021 (Garden Journal)

I have been preparing for planting vegetables such as pumpkin, sweet potato, and chili for a long time. I really just ended the summer season first and looked forward to September. The month of September is the beginning of winter here in the UAE. You will know this when the humidity has started.

While waiting for the winter, I prepared the soil and planting area as well as the seeds I planted in a plastic vase 2 weeks before September. But this pumpkin I planted in the middle of October already. Since the past month is the Watermelon and melon are first.

This pumpkin is only two weeks old and will be the third week this coming Friday. In raising or cultivating pumpkin seeds, I have no expectation that they will survive. Because pumpkin seeds came only from the pumpkin we bought at the Super Market.

However, I have been successful in growing squash from seed and you can see the result in the picture I shared. Now it has flowers and small fruits. But this is just the beginning.

Excess squash stalks should be removed or cut and only 3 to 4 stalks are left. The reason for this is so that other new shoots that have previously bloomed and fruited do not deprive of nutrients and continue to grow.

It is also necessary to guide the growing body of the squash as it crawls gradually every day, especially if your planting area is only small as mine.

There is another way. What they do is let it crawl up to the arbor they made, and the fruits just hang. The only problem you need to prepare for is the fruit when it grows. Because the fruit is so heavy that it weighs at least 4 kilos each, it will damage your trellis and can break the squash's attachment.

So my advice is, just let it grow naturally on the ground. Just guide the elongation of the body and always visit the pumpkin plant.