Pumpkin Autopsy.

After being gone for the better part of two weeks and having the deer strip the pumpkin patch clean of it's beautiful lush leaves, I started taking a hard look at each and every pumpkin and the patch as a whole... I had no clue as to exactly WHEN to harvest the pumpkins since this was our first planting and pumpkins are just not that common in this area. At one point late last week, I discovered some odd markings on one of the nice larger pumpkins and knew instantly that it was infected with something. I immediately cut it from the patch and hauled it to the barn for it's autopsy...

Of course, I was not a happy camper that a perfectly good pumpkin was ruined. And upon really looking at it's exterior (minus the blistering) one would NEVER know something was wrong with the fruit! An autopsy was the only way to find out what was in the pumpkin causing it damage from the inside out and just how much had it been damaged at this point. I was already thinking boring worms from my previous research.

Doesn't that just make your stomach turn??!

And imagine our surprise to find out just how bad it was damaged... Yuck! After this ordeal, I really hit the internet hard that Sunday night and learned a lot of great info on when and how to harvest your pumpkin patch. And at that moment the countdown to the pumpkin harvest madness at Wilsons Farms began....

More Tragedy in the Patch!

Why does it always seem to happen when we are away for a few days? Do the resident wildlife just KNOW that we are gone? It happened again... and it is MUCH worse this time. I am sad to announce the deer have treated our beautiful lush green pumpkin patch as a dinner buffet on a Saturday night. On three different nights this past week while we were on vacation in a far away place, the deer took advantage of our goods. And I have them on camera!

Yep, on three different nights the deer came through the fence knocking over a wood post and then having the buffet of its life. How bad is it? Just compare this next photo to the ones we posted early last week....

So sad, isn't it? The bad news: they ate almost 95% of the pumpkin leave slap off the vines! The good news: They did not touch the pumpkins.

The pumpkins are still good... Hopefully.. or at least until we harvest for the Halloween season!

Tragedy in the Patch!

You would have thought we learned our lesson the first time. We should have been more attentive to the timetable of our being gone for a week and not applying the liquid repellent before we left. You would have thought so... Hubby called with the news after he arrived at the farm on Friday afternoon... 6 days after our last visit to the farm. Probably 14+ days since we applied the liquid repellent to the deer/plot saver fencing around the pumpkin patch. UGH. Dang deer struck again!!!



Can you see they cleaned house on the leaves and blooms right off the vine extensions?





Dad gum varmint deer!!



So what do we do about it? We add an extension to the plot saver fence at dusk no less! That seemed to be the best option.







Had the opportunity to do more investigating around the plot in the sunlight of the next morning.... Yep, dang deer even pulled up some of my young jack-o-lantern plants, ate them and ate the tops out of the other small plants!



Hopefully, something will grow from the ones they left behind...



Of course, I just head on over to the good side of the patch and hug my big boy white pumpkins... makes the day much better!

Cleaning Up the Pumpkin Patch.

Once we picked all of our third planting of corn last Saturday, we pulled all the stalks down and tilled up those areas for weed control and general clean up. The running morning glory weeds have just taken over everything it seems... I can pulled them out every time I come into the patch, but they outnumber me thousands fold! The plot looked much better once we finished tilling up the corn rows!

Now you can start to see some of the pumpkins in the middle of the patch!

Celebrating 100 Posts!

This is our 100th post on this blog! And we are still going at Wilsons Farms... We are striving to keep things moving along at a pretty speedy pace. All the while the summer's items are slowing and dwindling down, we are gearing up for fall and all it has to offer. And also at the same time we are watching our pumpkin patch grow!

Pumpkin Watch - First Week in September:

We are really enjoying watching these white pumpkins grow day-by-day... we have 8-10 in fairly large sizes now. I wonder every single day if a) how much bigger will they get by first of October? and b) will the insects destroy them first? We also have many baby pumpkins from 1 inch diameter to small pumpkins in 4 inch diameter. But the large mama-jama ones are the most fascinating! They are HUGE and must weigh in the 20-30 lb range already.... now we have to figure out WHEN to harvest them!

This is one of our largest ones so far. I am amazed each day at how big it is... just keep putting the insect dust on it in hopes she makes it to October!

This is what you are greeted with when you drive up our driveway these days... you can see the vines have run all the way into the driveway!

This is a great view into the middle of the patch... can you see all the white pumpkins in between the large leaves?

We did harvest one medium sized pumpkin this past weekend since I noticed that it's stem was yellowing and not the bright green it should be. Plus something had drilled into its sides in 7-8 spots.

So I cut the pumpkin off the vine and we did a research and destroy experiment. First off, it had to weigh almost 20 lbs and is no where near the size of our large ones! And it was very easy to slice open... we cut it to see WHAT was drilling into it... and only found small 1 inch long paths into the thick rhine that did not have an actual worm or insect in them... Not sure why... But, the one that bored in through the vine did it's destruction enough to cut off the supply to the fruit.

I do feel a tad better hoping that the strong thick rhine deterred them from getting all the way inside to the soft middle... where the real destruction can take place. Fingers crossed they all make it to October!

Tilling For End of Season.

Sunday was an all around great day on the farm... the weather was perfect...not too hot, gorgeous sunshine and a slight hint of crispy autumn-like breezes in the shade. We accomplished a lot with a full work-day on the farm. We spent a huge portion of the day cutting grass all around the garden, the pumpkin patch and bush-hogging both clover plots. Once this was finished, we tilled up the "other" side of the pumpkin patch that did not recover from the thinning of the vines we did a few weekends ago. Hubby quickly tilled up that side of the patch and then we fertilized the soil and planted new orange pumpkin seeds.

An extra row between the corn stalks where the planter missed some seeds in the original patch planting...

The couple of sunflowers that made it from the deer feast earlier in July.

Next, we started the dreadful end-of-season task of removing the old plants from the garden in preparation of tilling the soil for fall plantings. Pulling up the stakes, removing the ties and cages, etc...

Removed the tomato and cucumber plants...

Pulling up the fence posts we used to support the twine for the cucumber vines to run up...

And then we tilled up that side of the garden.

This area where we tilled up the tomatoes and cucumber was also where we had our zucchini, squash, eggplants, cabbages and first planting of corn. We left the three rows in the middle intact since the green beans, okra and peppers are still producing. Oh, and Hubby loves his tiller.

Next up, we tilled where the second planting of corn, our first attempt at pumpkins and watermelons and the three rows of long peas...

Hate to see the beautiful purple-hull pea plants go, but they were all but finished producing and it is time to prep for autumn plantings!

Looks like two hot dogs really like freshly turned over soil for napping and cooling off!

And finally here Hubby is re-installing the perimeter fencing at the end of the day.