Proper planting and care of pumpkins in the open field. How to grow a pumpkin correctly or why not all summer residents have a successful harvest When to plant a pumpkin in open ground

The end of spring is the time to plant pumpkins. It can be grown in two ways: by sowing seeds in open ground and through seedlings. The second method is more suitable for central Russia and its northern part.

Growing pumpkin seedlings for open ground

The most common types of pumpkin for growing in household plots are hard-barked, large-fruited and nutmeg.

For experiment and comparison, grow all three varieties, then to decide on the best.

So, it is better to germinate pumpkin seeds before sowing: spread a cloth or paper napkins in 4 layers on a saucer, wet and lay the seeds, cover with a plastic bag and germinate for about 10 days, regularly opening for airing. The temperature in the room is 25-27°C. Readiness for sowing seeds will prompt you grown roots (length 0.5-1 cm).

20-30 days before planting pumpkin seedlings in open ground, which is about mid-May, fill peat pots with ready-made soil, one that is suitable for growing seedlings of cucumbers, or pre-prepared (peat, humus, rotted sawdust in a ratio of 2: 1 :one). Add "Kemira" or nitroammofoska to the soil mixture (1 tsp per 1 kg of the mixture). Water and sow. In the process of growth, make sure that the leaves do not touch each other (move the pots away). Pumpkin seedlings 10-15 cm high with 2-3 real leaves are ready for planting in open ground. A week before planting, harden off the plants by lowering the temperature during the day to 15 ° C and at night to 12 ° C with frequent airing.

soil and place

The soil for growing pumpkins requires loose, nutritious, sandy loam with a neutral pH. Well, if the predecessor was potatoes, tomatoes, cabbage or beans. Pumpkin is not grown after cucumbers, squash and zucchini. The place is chosen warm, dry, with a southern slope.

For planting pumpkin seedlings, holes are prepared (1 hole for 1 plant) 10 cm deep, at a distance of 1-1.5 m, and between rows 2 m, since the plant is quite climbing. Before planting seedlings, 2 kg of compost is added to each well and watered with 2 liters of warm water. The plants are planted in gruel and covered with dry earth so that a crust does not form. In the first 7 days after planting, pumpkin seedlings are covered with cut 5-liter plastic bottles or special paper caps.

If pumpkin seeds were sown in plastic cups, then the plants must be removed so that the root system is not damaged, otherwise it will not work to grow a good pumpkin. Overgrown pumpkin seedlings are planted obliquely, with the tops in one direction.

pumpkin care

Watering is moderate, around the stem, as the pumpkin root system goes to a depth of 3 meters and has the ability to enrich itself with moisture from the depths of the soil. With ovaries the size of a fist, you can switch to drip irrigation. The easiest way to drip irrigation is to put a container of water near each plant and lower the edge of the cotton rope into it, wrap the whip with the other end and sprinkle it with earth near the roots.

If the pumpkin is pampered with frequent or abundant watering, then the roots will “forget” about their capabilities, and you will be attached to the plants.

There is an opinion that it is better to water the pumpkin often, then you need to do this every week at the rate of 20-30 liters of water per 1 sq. m, starting from the germination period to flowering, during flowering, watering is reduced for better fruit set, and continues again until harvest.

After watering or rain, it is imperative to loosen the row spacing, until the leaves grow and close together.

Fertilize every 15-20 days alternating organic (for 10 liters of water 2 liters of slurry, 40 g of superphosphate and 40 g of wood ash) with mineral (for 10 liters of water 30 g of ammonium nitrate, 50 g of superphosphate and 30 g of potassium salt). The calculation is 1 liter per plant at the beginning of development and 5 liters per plant at the end of summer. Combine fertilizing with watering.

To obtain large pumpkin fruits, shaping is required; without this, you cannot grow a good pumpkin. To do this, remove the lateral non-fruiting shoots, leaving one ovary on the main stem and two lateral ones. Above each fruit, 5-6 leaves are left, and the growth point is pinched. The approximate length of the main stem is 1.3-1.5 m, the side shoots are 0.6-0.7 m. Remove the flowers that appear further.

In windy weather, the whips can roll over, so it is best to pin them down in advance or sprinkle them with moist soil.

Planks or plywood sheets are placed under the fruits of the pumpkin for and from possible decay (from contact with the ground).

If the pumpkin has huge leaves that interfere with the pollination of flowers, then they should be thinned out.

If during the flowering period the pumpkin does not give ovaries or in dry weather forms irregularly shaped fruits, then carry out artificial pollination. To do this, pick a few blooming male flowers in the morning, pick off the petals and run the anthers along the stigmas of the female flowers. The procedure can be carried out several times with extreme caution.

Slug damage to pumpkins can be repaired. To do this, all damaged soft tissue is cut out with a knife and the resulting hole is sealed with adhesive tape. In 2 months, the crust will recover and the pumpkin will be subject to a long one.

Grow pumpkin seeds, sown in open ground in mid-May, when dandelions bloom, and always in dry, warm weather. It will be better if the seeds are sprouted, with roots about 0.5 cm long.

Before sowing, for each square meter of soil, add humus (2 buckets), sawdust (0.5 buckets), nitrophoska (1 cup), wood ash (liter jar). Dig the area to a depth of about 40 cm, make beds 70 cm wide and spill them with hot water to disinfect. Holes are made every 90 cm, 8-10 cm deep for light sandy soil and 5-6 cm for heavy soil. Throw 2-3 seeds into each hole. After sowing, make a film shelter, which can be removed after a month.
Thinning is carried out when the seedlings have 2 true leaves. Weak seedlings pinch, do not pull out, due to the possibility of damage to the neighbor's root system, as a result, you have only one strong plant in the hole.

In early September, choose an auspicious day for harvesting pumpkins. It should be dry, warm weather. The maturity of a pumpkin is determined by a shrunken stalk 3-5 cm in size and a hard bark (does not press through with a finger). When harvesting, try to avoid mechanical damage to the fruit, as this affects the keeping quality.

Pumpkin is an incredibly healthy vegetable that is not at all difficult to grow, so it has a place in almost any garden. The easiest way to do this is to plant pumpkin seeds in open ground. Of course, if the spring is warm enough, and the summer is long, so that the crop has time to ripen before frost.

How to select and prepare seeds for planting

You can buy pumpkin seeds for planting at the store or collect pumpkin seeds that have been planted in your garden in previous years and have fully ripened. Everyone knows how to collect the seeds: you just need to take them out and wash them after cutting the ripe fruit, and then dry and store all the collected material for future sowing in a bag made of natural fabric. They are considered usable for as long as 4 years, but fresh seeds are not planted, it is better to keep them for a couple of years, then germination will increase significantly. A large full-weight grain will give a healthy plant, so the planting material is calibrated in size, and the unusable is discarded. To do this, it is enough to soak the pumpkin seeds before planting in salted water - the worst of the seeds will remain on the surface.

Vegetable growers often talk about how to properly prepare the seed. It must not only be selected, but also disinfected, stimulated germination. To protect their future plants from diseases, the seeds are treated with various substances. Most often, they are placed in a bright pink solution of potassium permanganate for several hours, but potassium humate, krezacin, wood ash infusion can be used.

All these activities are designed to protect plants after planting pumpkins in open ground. Is it possible to do without it? Certainly. Whether it is necessary to soak pumpkin seeds before planting, each owner decides for himself. But, as a rule, all preparatory chores take a little time and attention, while increasing the germination and quality of plants.

Germinating and hardening seeds

Before planting a pumpkin in open ground with seeds, the soaked seeds are germinated or wait only for the sprouts to hatch, and then they are hardened. This will help to get shoots faster, which means to reduce the total growth time, that is, to have time to grow a crop, even if the summer ends early, especially since the pumpkin grows better with less than 12 hours of daylight, being a short daylight plant. And hardening will increase the immunity of plants, make them stronger in changing weather conditions.

In order to make it easier for the sprout to overcome the skin of the seed, the seeds are heated for 8–9 hours at a temperature of + 50–60 degrees. You can use the oven for these purposes or just hold them in the sun, periodically turning them over for even heating. After that, they are placed in an ash solution for 12 hours (2 tablespoons of wood ash and 1 liter of boiling water are infused until the temperature becomes acceptable - about +50 degrees) or simply wrapped with gauze thoroughly soaked with a solution, previously folded several times.

Before planting, sprouted or hatched seeds are placed in the refrigerator for the last day, leaving them on the bottom shelf. Sometimes they are simply alternately kept for 10 hours in a room, 2 in the refrigerator, and only then they are planted.

Top dressing and other soil preparation

Choose a sunny location for your pumpkin patch, although many varieties grown in partial shade do not lose out when it comes time to harvest. The soil should be non-acidic, fertile, loose enough so that the water does not stagnate, and air gets to the roots. The best option would be fertile sandy loam or loam. In the same place, pumpkin crops are planted no earlier than after 5 years. Cereals, legumes, cabbage, green manure and perennial grasses are considered good predecessors.

Before planting pumpkin seeds in the garden, it is worth doing some preparatory work. The site is best prepared in the fall. It needs to be freed from weeds, dug up to the depth of a shovel bayonet, add humus and compost, you can even unripe mullein, with a total complexity of up to 10 kg per 1 square meter of area.

You need to add superphosphate and potash fertilizers (up to 20 g each), a 1-liter jar of wood ash. If the soil is too heavy, sawdust is added to it (preferably semi-rotted), sand, and loam should be added to too sandy. If the soil is acidic, then in the fall dolomite flour or even lime is added to it. Those who did not have time to enrich the soil in the fall usually fertilize before planting directly on the bottom of the hole.

Landing dates

The timing of planting pumpkins is determined by the climatic conditions of the region. Pumpkins are sown in the ground in the south, usually in early May, a little to the north - by the end of May, in the summer (if the weather does not allow it earlier), it is better to grow this vegetable not directly from seeds, but through seedlings. Before planting a pumpkin in open ground, you need to make sure that the earth has warmed up to a depth of at least 10 cm to +12 degrees. At lower temperatures, they will germinate very slowly, and may even rot.

The planting dates are calculated as follows: it is necessary to harvest the crop before the arrival of frost, it usually takes 3.5–4 months from the appearance of sprouts to fruit ripening, prepared seeds germinate less than a week, unprepared seeds - from 10 to 14 days.

Knowing when the cold comes in the fall, when the earth warms up to the desired temperature in the spring, you can navigate with the timing of sowing.

Planting seeds in the ground

Now it's time to talk, in fact, about how to plant pumpkin seeds. On the selected and prepared plot of the garden in the spring, the weeds that have appeared are removed, they dig up (or simply loosen) the bed, dig shallow holes 30 cm in diameter at a distance of 80–100 cm from each other. A distance of one and a half to two meters is left between the rows. It is best to arrange the holes in a checkerboard pattern. If fertilizers were not applied in the fall, then at least 5 kg of organic and 1 tablespoon of complex mineral fertilizers, wood ash are placed at the bottom of each hole (which are dug deeper). All this is slightly mixed with the ground. 1–1.5 liters of hot (about +50 degrees) water is poured into each hole, and after it is absorbed, seeds can be planted.

3-5 pieces are placed in each hole to a depth of 5 to 8 cm, planted not side by side, but at the maximum possible distance from each other. Then sprinkled with earth, sawdust or humus. After all the plants sprout, they will have a couple of true leaves. Only two plants remain. Which pumpkin to choose will show their condition, the rest are pinched off at the very ground.

Video "Planting pumpkins in open ground"

In this video you will hear useful tips for planting a pumpkin.

Pumpkin is beautiful and healthy, many delicious main dishes and desserts are prepared from it - this is a wonderful reason to plant it on your site. This fantastic vegetable came to us from the tropics, it loves the sun and nutritious soil, but it feels quite comfortable in our summer cottages.

Many delicious varieties of pumpkin can be grown by sowing seeds in open ground at the end of May, but not nutmeg - they simply will not sprout, they are best grown in seedlings. Seeds should be taken only fresh, it is advisable to check them for germination in order to know what to expect after sowing in the ground. Seeds that floated when soaked in salt water are discarded; those that have sunk to the bottom are prepared for sowing.

Pumpkin seeds before sowing need to be heated for 2-3 hours at a temperature of 60 degrees. After that, you need to disinfect them with a pink solution of potassium permanganate. In order for the sprout to be able to break through the hard skin of the seed, they are soaked for 12 hours with an aqueous infusion of ash or at least just water, which is changed every 4 hours. Those summer residents who are not afraid to use chemistry usually soak the seeds with a solution of fertilizers or a stimulant (crezacin, epin, potassium humate) to speed up germination. This not only accelerates growth, but also protects future seedlings from diseases and adverse environmental influences.

After soaking, the seeds are immediately planted in the ground or placed for germination. Seeds on sawdust germinate well and quickly. Sawdust is placed at the bottom of the box, spilled several times with hot water, seeds are placed on top of several layers of wet gauze, covered with several more layers of gauze and covered with sawdust. From above, the box is covered with a film - it turns out such a greenhouse, after 2-3 days the seeds will germinate, and they will need to be immediately planted in the ground.

Landing and care

Before sowing, it is desirable to prepare the soil. For 1 square meter of a plot for a pumpkin, 2 buckets of humus, half a bucket of sawdust, a glass of nitrophoska and a liter jar of wood ash are brought in. The site is thoroughly dug up to a depth of at least 40 cm and spilled with hot water. Sowing dates are determined by vegetable growers themselves, it depends on the weather and the characteristics of the variety. The hatched seeds of a large-fruited and hard-barked pumpkin are planted in the soil when it has already warmed up to 10 degrees at a depth of 10-12 cm. In the Moscow region, this usually happens at the end of May.

In light permeable soil, the seed is laid 8-10 cm, and if the earth is hard, then 4-5 cm with the beak or sprout down. If the planting is shallow, the sprouts can sprout without dropping the seed coat, then they can be pecked by birds. To prevent this from happening, you can close the crops or just check more often and remove the shell manually. A bush pumpkin is planted at a distance of 80 cm from each other, and it is better to plant a climbing pumpkin with an interval of 1 m.

3-5 seeds are placed in each hole at a distance of several centimeters. After sowing, the soil is mulched, many are advised to cover it with a film or non-woven fabric from the spring cold. When sprouts appear, leave the 2 strongest, and pinch off the rest. The pumpkin has a very developed root system, small sprouts are already intertwined with roots so as not to damage them (with the slightest damage to the root, the pumpkin will not grow), the extra ones are not pulled out, but they are pinched off.

After planting seedlings in open ground or sprouting from seeds, side shoots quickly form at the pumpkin, they need to be removed, leaving two more side shoots in addition to the main lash. The number of ovaries must also be limited, leaving 3-4 on each branch: after counting 5 leaves after the last ovary, the lash must be pinned, then the plant will not waste energy, but will direct them to fruit ripening.

So that the wind does not turn the whips over, they are sprinkled with moist soil, in which case additional roots may form, which will further strengthen the plant. Wide pumpkin leaves evaporate a lot of moisture, so watering is a must, and only with warm water. After planting in open ground, each plant is watered with 1 liter of water, and the older it is, the more water it needs, so at the end of summer each should receive at least 10 liters. When the fruits have reached their maximum size, watering is stopped.

If there are few bees or bumblebees on the site during the flowering of the pumpkin, you will have to pollinate the plant manually. Male flowers do not sit on a stem, but grow on a long stem, unlike female flowers, and female flowers have a thickening (ovary) under the petals - so they are easy to recognize. In the morning (from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m.) you need to pick a male flower, carefully pick off the petals from it, and touch the pistils of the female flowers with an anther.

It happens that the female flowers bloom before the male ones, then you can pollinate the male flowers of another related plant - a zucchini or squash will do. The fruits will ripen perfectly, but the seeds can no longer be used for planting, so if you want to sell or plant seeds, then you need to pollinate only the flowers of the same plant.

Video “Pumpkin Planting”

From the video you will learn how to plant a pumpkin in a simple and effective way.

How to protect yourself from pests

After planting a pumpkin in open ground, you need to think about protecting it from pests. So that the bear does not gnaw the roots, several granules of a special preparation called Medvedox are placed in each hole during planting.

In damp rainy weather, slugs may appear that are able to destroy the pumpkin. Melon aphids, spider mites, sprout flies and click beetles - the pumpkin has many enemies. To avoid danger, you need to loosen, do not overmoisten the soil, do not leave uprooted weeds, because many are attracted to plant debris. No wonder gardeners often inspect their plants, at the first appearance of pests, you need to spray the plant with an infusion of onion peel, ash, and soapy water.

Germ fly larvae can only damage planted seedlings if they are attracted to the smell of fresh manure. Nutcracker (wireworm) may remain from previous crops of perennial grasses. Good tillage and a well-thought-out crop rotation will allow you to secure plantings.

There are many chemicals that save from pests, it is not difficult to find them, but you need to remember that ripening fruits can absorb harmful substances too. It will not be superfluous to plant onions, dill and marigolds nearby.

top dressing

Pumpkins are planted in fertilized soil, and then they are also fed with liquid organic-mineral fertilizers. If the soil is rich in fertilizers, it is enough to pour liquid diluted bird droppings or mullein with 1 spoon of full mineral fertilizer 2-3 times during the entire growth period.

Planting a pumpkin in depleted soil means dooming yourself to weekly plant fertilization throughout the season. Only at the end of summer, when the fruits are already large, potassium can be applied as a mineral supplement.

Video “Planting seedlings in open ground”

To properly plant seedlings in open ground, we recommend watching the following video tutorial. An experienced gardener will tell you about all the nuances and features of the process.

It is popular among Central American farmers to hold competitions to determine the largest pumpkin. In American culture, a pumpkin is an integral part of Halloween (a holiday in honor of evil spirits). The fruit is freed from the pulp, a face is cut out on the surface, and a lamp is inserted inside.

Very fond of pumpkin and in Russia. The culture is unpretentious in cultivation and care, even inexperienced vegetable growers will cope with this task. Excellent fruiting in the temperate zone and in the northern regions, while not requiring the construction of greenhouses.

In gratitude for the elementary care, the plant will give a high yield.

Terms of sowing pumpkin seeds in the ground

Pumpkin seeds in open ground depends on weather conditions:

Pumpkin is a heat-loving plant, so it should be planted when the earth warms up to at least +10 - +12 ° С and night frosts are no longer expected.
In terms of timing, this is most often May 10-15 in the conditions of the middle zone, sometimes you can plant it already on the 5-6th.

If there is a threat of frost, seedlings will need to be covered with cut plastic bottles, cans or film cover. Some gardeners use the old-fashioned way: they make fires at night to ward off frost from the site.

You can plant a pumpkin in a cold greenhouse (under a film shelter) much earlier: already from the end of March to the end of April. This method is very popular with the most impatient vegetable growers who want to harvest a month and a half earlier.

Place to grow pumpkins

Illumination of the site and the presence of groundwater

To get a good harvest, pick up a site for pumpkins that is well lit by sunlight. It is better to plant on hills, the occurrence of groundwater should be more than 1 m. Low-lying and damp areas are contraindicated.

Wind protection and soil composition

A good location would be the south side of a wall or fence. This will provide protection from cold winds and maximum access to the warming rays of the sun.

The soil requires nutritious, saturated with organic fertilizers, the reaction is neutral.

predecessors

Favorable crop precursors can positively affect yields: beans, peas, cabbage, tomatoes, potatoes.

Do not plant a pumpkin after cucumbers, squash, zucchini.

Site preparation

The preparation of the site should be done in advance (even since the fall). For deep digging (to a depth of at least a shovel bayonet), fertilizer should be applied.

For 1 m², you will need 2 buckets of humus, 1 liter can of wood ash, 200 g of superphosphate and 100 g of potassium chloride, the last two ingredients can be replaced with 1 glass of nitrophoska.
In the spring, immediately before planting, the area is leveled with a rake, having previously scattered ammonium nitrate in the amount recommended by the manufacturer.
Spill the ridges with hot water (temperature 80 ° C) to disinfect from possible diseases.

What to put in the hole when planting a pumpkin

It happens that in the fall they did not have time to prepare the site, then you can get out of the situation in another way: when planting, 1 kg of humus is put in each hole, you can add wood ash by the harvest. If there is no organic matter, put 30 grams of complex mineral fertilizers (for example, ammophos, nitrophoska, nitroammophoska, potassium nitrate) in each well. A good mixture would be 10 gr. potassium sulfate + 20 gr. superphosphate per well.

Treatment of pumpkin seeds before planting

How to soak pumpkins before planting? Whether it is necessary to germinate pumpkin seeds before planting, everyone decides for himself. Even without pre-soaking, pumpkin seeds germinate well if the soil is sufficiently moist. To do this, after sowing, you need to water the wells.

Please note that pre-treated seeds will have to be watered: if the seeds wake up and get a lot of moisture at the start, and the ground is dry and hot, the seedlings will die.

Seed suitability testing and disinfection

A common mistake: some gardeners sometimes sow old seeds, naturally they do not get seedlings. If you are not sure about the planting material, the seeds must first be checked for germination. Immerse in normal saline solution. Those that have sunk to the bottom are of high quality. Then hold for 10 minutes in a slightly pink solution of potassium permanganate to disinfect from diseases, and be sure to rinse.

Do I need to soak squash before planting?

Do I need to germinate pumpkin seeds before planting? If you are ready to pay a little more attention to the care of the pumpkin, the procedure will be useful: seedlings will appear much earlier.

How to germinate a pumpkin for planting

Seeds are soaked to speed up germination. To do this, the seeds are placed in a damp cloth to constantly monitor how swollen they are - start sowing when they swell and peck a little, but do not germinate. If the seeds are overexposed and they start up thick roots, they can be broken during sowing and there will be no shoots.

Soaked and germinated seeds are planted in the mud or watered immediately after planting.

How to treat pumpkin seeds before planting to improve growth

There is another good way: soak for a day in a solution of potassium humate or sodium humate, then place it in a damp cloth for 1-2 days. Maintain the air temperature at 22-23 °C.

Proper planting of pumpkins in open ground

Scheme of planting pumpkins in open ground

It is important to dig a bed under a pumpkin very deeply (about 40 cm).
Make a ridge about 70 cm wide. The holes should run in the center.
Keep a distance of about 0.8 m between individual holes.
The width of the passage between the ridges is 70 cm.

Planting depth of pumpkin seeds

Germinated seeds in moist soil, planting depth is 6 cm. For reliability, sow 2 seeds in one hole, and when the sprouts appear, remove the weaker specimen.

Outdoor pumpkin care

How to pinch and shape whips

Proper for a pumpkin in the open field, first of all, is the formation of the plant. When the main stem reaches a length of 1.3-1.5 m, pinch it, leave 2 side shoots 60-70 cm long. Form one fruit on each shoot. That is, one plant will “nourish” three fruits: one on the main shoot and one on two side shoots.

Remove excess shoots and flowers. To improve the pouring of fruits, the left shoots are recommended to be pressed to the ground with a wire or a horn made of wood and sprinkled with a small layer of soil (6-7 cm), so the lashes will take root in this place. Place plywood under each fruit, or better - a piece of glass (you will get additional heating and a dry surface).

How to feed

Favorably on the size of the fruit will affect the introduction of dressings:

Feed the first time, when 3-5 leaves appear, repeat the procedure with an interval of 15 days.
You can use organic matter (for 10 liters of water 1 liter of mullein infusion, consumption - for 2 plants)
or mineral fertilizers (2 tablespoons of nitrophoska for the same volume, consumption is similar).

How to water

Pumpkin is hygrophilous. During flowering and fruiting, water about once a week. Under each bush, add 20-30 liters of warm water. Do not make abundant moisture until the fruits grow a little (all the strength can go into the leaves). Loosen the soil after watering. Remove weeds regularly.

Harvest and storage

In order for the pumpkins to be stored well and for a long time, the ripened fruits must be cut together with the stalk (5-6 cm long). Store in a dry place, it is possible at room temperature, but at a temperature range of 5-8 ° C, the fruits can be stored until spring.

Diseases and pests

Pumpkins have a lot of diseases and pests, so you should study possible problems and methods of dealing with them.

Diseases of pumpkin:

Bacteriosis - manifests itself with high humidity and sudden changes in temperature. Brown spots and sores appear on the leaves and fruits. Remove affected leaves. Treat with a solution of cadium sulfate or Bordeaux mixture.
White rot is a fungal disease that affects the entire plant (leaves, shoots, fruits). It can be recognized by a whitish coating, if no action is taken, the plant will rot. Sprinkle the affected areas and the beds themselves with copper sulfate powder, fluff lime or crushed charcoal.
Root rot - the development of the disease provokes watering with cold water or sudden changes in temperature. In the fight against the disease, they proceed as follows: cut off the rotten roots, treat with a fungicide, sprinkle with earth on top so that the plant takes root.
Powdery mildew - a white coating appears on the leaves, they gradually dry out, the fruits develop poorly. Remove affected leaves, treat with isophene or colloidal sulfur.

Among the pests:

Spider mite - a thin cobweb appears on the reverse side of the leaf plate, the plant withers (the pest sucks out the juices). Rinse with plain water, spray with a solution of infusion of onion peel or garlic.
Melon aphid - small greenish insects provoke twisting and drying of leaf plates. Carry out the treatment with a 10% solution of karbofos.

Prevention from diseases and pests is proper care.

Pumpkin varieties

To date, 800 hybrids have been registered and. About 30 are suitable for growing on the plot for human consumption (they are sweet).

Consider the best of them, classifying by maturity.

Early ripe (sugar content is 5.5-9%):
Muscat (the ripening period is 90 days);
Butternut (it will take 100 days to ripen),
Therapeutic (matures for 100-115 days).

Mid-season (maximum yield, sugar content is 7-13%):

Almond
Marble
Barn

Late-ripening varieties (sugar content about 12%, technical ripening period is 140-160 days):

Dawn of the East
Winter sweet
Gribovskaya winter

If you have a small plot of land, and you have not decided what to plant on it, be sure to add a pumpkin to the list. Caring for her is not difficult, but the harvest is rich. And about how to plant a pumpkin in open ground, I will tell you in detail in this article.

Growing pumpkins is easy

How to plant a pumpkin: site preparation

If you are interested in the richest harvest, then you need to choose the right place for planting. The ridge should be located in a warm place, on the sunny side. The soil can be any, but sandy or sandy loam is preferable, such soil warms up better. Best planted after winter wheat, corn or perennial grasses. You can also pick up ridges after a tomato, onion, potato, cabbage or carrot. It is not recommended to plant after cucumbers or squash. It is impossible to plant in the same place, you need to wait 5 years after the previous planting.

Preparing the soil for planting pumpkins

The land for planting is to be prepared in the fall, for this it is necessary to perform the following work:

Clear the land of plant residues.
Loosen shallow with a hoe.
After 2-3 weeks, the earth needs to be dug up, while collecting weed roots.
In the spring, before planting, dig again, with the addition of nitrogen fertilizers, after which the ridge is leveled with a rake.
High ridges are being made. The heavier the earth, the higher the ridge. A standard ridge should be 1-1.5 meters wide, 25 centimeters high. The width of the furrows between the ridges should be about half a meter.

Fertilizing before planting pumpkins in open ground

When digging the earth, be sure to fertilize the soil. Pumpkin after planting begins to grow rapidly, for this you need a lot of nutrients. The best option for fertilizer is humus or manure. A bucket of manure or humus is brought per square meter.

Pumpkin loves abundant manure fertilizer

With heavy soils to a depth of 10-15 centimeters, on light soils - 15-20 centimeters. If you do not have the required amount of manure, then you can only put it in seedling holes - 1..2 kilograms per hole. In addition to manure, 20 grams of superphosphate and 10 grams of potassium sulfate are also added. Or use complex fertilizers, a tablespoon per plant.

Planting pumpkin seeds

For a large area, you need a seeder. For this, melon seeders SBN-3 and SBU-2-4 are used. At the first seeder, planting seeds in 2-3 rows, with an interval of 140 or 180 centimeters. For small gardens, they are not suitable, you have to plant the seeds by hand.

Important: Planting with seeds is carried out only in early varieties of pumpkin, such as nutmeg and hardbark. The remaining varieties are planted only through seedlings.

How to plant a pumpkin

If you are interested in a good harvest, you need to choose full-weight seeds. To select the best seeds, salted water is prepared, into which the seed is dipped, and the floating seeds are rejected. The rest is collected, washed and dried.

Pumpkin seeds keep up to four years

Seeds can be stored for up to 4 years. For a better shoot and a healthy harvest, it is necessary to carry out preparatory measures:

warming up. This process will give good shoots, done at 60 degrees, within 2-3 hours.
hardening. The plant must endure temperature extremes, for this, the seeds are kept at a temperature of +1 degree for two days.
Increasing disease resistance. Diseases can damage shoots that have not yet grown strong, and to prevent this from happening, the seeds are treated with a solution of potassium permanganate, potassium cumate or wood ash infused in water.
seed germination. To do this, they are wrapped in wet gauze, in a couple of days the first shoots will appear.

Of all the gourds, the pumpkin is the most resistant to cold, so it is planted in late spring, when the possibility of frost is already excluded. If you hurry and plant early, then the seeds in the cold ground will simply rot, so they are planted when the soil temperature reaches +13 degrees. One plant needs 1-4 square meters of soil for nutrition.

Please note: For early varieties, the area may be less - for later varieties, more, so the distance between plants is very important.

For long climbing varieties, it is necessary to leave a distance between the holes of 1.5-2 meters, and between rows also up to 2 meters. Bush varieties are planted in a square of 80 by 80 centimeters. On light soils, planting depth should be 5-8 centimeters, on heavy soils 4-5 centimeters. From 2-5 seeds are placed in one hole, at a distance of three centimeters from each other.

Pumpkin should be planted at a distance from each other

Planting pumpkins through seedlings

This method is chosen for late-ripening varieties with a growing season of 120-140 days. To do this, the seeds are germinated in April or early May. The main thing is to calculate the planting time so that the monthly seedlings are already planted in the ground.

Pumpkin planting for seedlings is done in peat pots or cassettes

For planting seedlings, peat pots with a diameter of 15 centimeters are purchased and filled with soil. You can buy the land ready or prepare it yourself. To do this, take 4 parts of humus and mix with one part of soddy soil. The prepared soil is fertilized, a bucket will require 4 grams of ammonium nitrate, 4 grams of potassium salt, 5 grams of superphosphate. The resulting mixture is moistened and stirred. Seeds are sown to a depth of two centimeters and covered with a film. The germination temperature should be +18..25 degrees, after the first sprouts appear, the film is removed, and the temperature drops to +15..20 degrees. To do this, the room is simply ventilated more often, if this is not done, then the seedlings will simply stretch out. Watering is also not done often, so as not to get pampered seedlings.

Important: The first top dressing is carried out a week after the emergence of sprouts. The second is produced before planting, any complex fertilizer is suitable for this.

Planting seedlings in open ground is carried out in warm weather, with frosts you will simply lose seedlings. The planting pattern is the same as when planting seeds. Holes are dug large to plant along with a clod of earth. Wells before planting are spilled with hot water. Deepen the seedlings to the leaves, this will allow additional roots to form. After planting, seedlings should be watered.