www.mapleridgenews.com - THE NEWS - Friday, October 29, 2010 – 27
THE NEWS/home&gardening
How to grow The Great Pumpkin Last Sunday on Thornhill, in east Maple Ridge, a group of self-proclaimed ‘pumpkineers’ braved the stormy weather and gathered on an undisclosed gravel road to begin a day of festivities honouring the humble pumpkin.
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know this guy named Linus van Pelt who worships a pagan deity he refers to as ‘The Great Pumpkin.’ His religion is not a particularly demanding one, as he need only pay homage but once a year – that being on the evening of the last day in October. In preparation for this Gardening Mike Lascelle momentous occasion, he dedicates his entire garden to the cultivation of a single crop, an archaic vegetable called pumpkin. Said vegetable is generally round or slightly squat in shape, orange in colour (variations do exist) and serves little purpose except as the primary ingredient of a festive pie. Anyways, every Halloween Linus sits in the midst of his pumpkin patch in hopes that ‘The Great Pumpkin’ will find it the most sincere and shower him with gifts beyond the imagination. Needless to say, with so many pumpkin patches across this globe and only one found worthy, there are a lot of disappointed Linus types out there. Such was not the case last Sunday on Thornhill in east Maple Ridge, where a group of self-proclaimed ‘pumpkineers’ braved the stormy weather and gathered on an undisclosed gravel road to begin a day of festivities honouring the humble pumpkin. The celebrations began with a pumpkin roll, pitting the round vegetable against gravity, bumps in the roadway and water hazards also known as ditches. There were surprisingly few casualties in this event, and despite the prevailing
Mike Lascelle photos
(From left) Hendrik Meekel and daughter get ready for the pumpkin roll; Klaus von Hardenberg weighs the 130-pound winning pumpkin; Pascal Bouchard won for best adult pumpkin carving. logic that bigger was better, such was not the case – as it turned out to be a contest of pure luck. Of course, there was no serious competition until it came to the weighing-in of pumpkins that afternoon at Thornhill hall. Here the heavyweights were carefully scrutinized while onlookers complained of poor weather, a rainy spring or deer munching (which diminished much needed poundage). Excuses aside, it was the weigh scale that would determine the three winners, with Ken Hemminger coming out on top with his 130-pound colossus. He credits his success to following a strict feeding regimen of SuperKelp, 20-20-20 and Epsom salts – watering only in the morning and being careful not to moisten the foliage. Ken also started them out under mini 8x10’ greenhouses and only allowed two pumpkins per plant to set, after which all new flowers were cut off. Similarly, each vine was only allowed to grow to 25’ (side shoots to 5’) and kept to that size with occasional pruning.
Of course, there were other secret growing ingredients, including fresh rabbit pellets, grass clippings, aged horse and chicken manure, leaf mulch, compost, a few Crappies (fish that is) and the most revered fertilizer/love. Dan Kosicki admitted to resorting to more drastic feeding methods when his entry appeared to be languishing – hooking it up to an intravenous feed of Budweiser beer. Coincidentally, his pumpkin also had the fattest stem (by three fold) of any of the other entries, exhibiting what I believe to be the vegetable version of a beer belly, perhaps even the first of its kind. Karen Read, winner of the smallest pumpkin at 10g (yes, that’s in grams) was away on holiday, but her husband was kind to enough to reveal the secrets to her success. She grew her prize-winning entry in an old tire under big cedar trees that shaded them out and hogged most of the groundwater. She, too, tried fish fertilizer, burying two salmon heads before planting. That evening we gathered again at the
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hall to judge the Jack-O-Lanterns and hand out the much-deserved awards. The most exuberant recipient was by far young Max Meekel, who placed second in the pumpkin rolling contest – although I have to say that Ken Hemminger’s victory lap around the hall to the theme of Rocky was quite inspiring. The people’s choice award for best adult pumpkin carving was the thorny character you see above, which was the artistic brainchild of Pascal Bouchard. Perhaps the most telling comment of the evening was my daughter’s casual remark that it seemed weird (in a good way) for all these people (about 35 families) to get together over pumpkins – and yet, I suspect that that was the goal of organizers Betty and Klaus von Hardenberg all along. And if community spirit can indeed be found in such an unlikely source, then I think we should all be growing a few more great pumpkins. Mike Lascelle is a local nursery manager and gardening author (hebe_acer@hotmail.com).
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