[Homestead] Volunteers

Leslie cayadopi at yahoo.com
Mon Jul 27 16:20:57 EDT 2009


Volunteer............. I planted those Mammoth Sunflowers, most range around 8-10' tall with some of the stems the width of my forearm.  Each one has dutifully put out one huge flower at the top.  The seeds are so swollen and I can't wait for the time to harvest them.
 
Except for one oddball............ it is still growing taller and taller and looks about 12' tall now.... not unusual for the package... except that over the last week or so it put out these flower shoots the whole way up the stalk.... there must be 20+ flowers getting ready to open.  Uhhhh,,, OK.  I wonder what kind of flowers they will be.........
 
 
OK, here's my funny NEWBIE GARDENER story of the week.........
 
I purchased some pumpkin seed from an on-line supplier, and made sure I was nice and careful and picked out a variety that will produce small sized pumpkins since I wanted to grow some pumpkins, but not a whole lot.  I planted 3 seeds and got 3 plants.  Great ! Good start.
 
About 3 weeks ago I get all excited when I notice my first yelllow little pumpkin is growing.  I talk to it, pat it, water it each day, and sure enough that must have worked because it is getting bigger, right on schedule.... or so I think.   Last weekend I thought for sure it was near full size in diameter, and I know we should be getting closer to the maturity date.
 
This week it keeps growing and has doubled in size with no signs of ribbing or turning orange or anything.  So I'm thinking, well I guess it's going to get a little bit bigger.
 
While rummaging around in my seed box I came across the original package purchased to try to find number of days to maturity, just to double check my memory,,,, but wait,,,,,,, the package had never been opened.  How could that be?
 
I rummage further and I find another seed package for pumpkin, and this one was open.   Where did this come from?  I don't remember buying it.  The only thing I notice on the front of the package is that it says "organic" - I probably grabbed it at Walmart on an impulse....  
 
So I turn it over to see how many days to maturity on this one.  (Since I now have 9 pumpkins growing and more and more runners with babies every day waiting for the swarms bees to do their thing - they love these plants...).  
 
Did I mention before that these 3 pumpkin plants are worse than my beans on steriods?  They now cover an area 20' x 12' with runners going further, except I keep turning them back.
 
Well, I turn over the package to get days to maturity, and what do I see????  There in the "fine print" it says, these pumpkins can grow to 6 feet' in diameter and weigh over 100 pounds !!!!!
 
LOL... WHAT ????  So much for planting a variety that will only put out SMALL pumpkins...
 
 
Talk about an OOPS !
 
 
 
I've been shelling dried beans today.  So far so good.
More cukes than I know what to do with.
 
I was surprised at some of the dried beans.  We haven't had rain in forever, until yesterday when I started to pick the dried pods.... and of course it decided to finally rain.  When back out today to pick some more, and some of the dried beans inside the pods decided to sprout !!   Guess I'd better get back out there and pick a lot more dried beans...  I'm hoping the plants will put out another round of flowers and repeat....
 
 
 

--- On Sat, 7/25/09, Clansgian at wmconnect.com <Clansgian at wmconnect.com> wrote:


From: Clansgian at wmconnect.com <Clansgian at wmconnect.com>
Subject: Re: [Homestead] Volunteers
To: homestead at lists.ibiblio.org
Date: Saturday, July 25, 2009, 10:52 PM




> >Strangest things you've ever seen!  Anyone else come up with bizarre 
> volunteers?

Same sort of thing as you describe.  A volunteer squash came up and the 
fruit is like a Lakota squash (Hubbard type) but the skin is parallel ribbed 
and light yellow except the narrow neck which is crooked and warted,.

Nothing resembling it was planted there and in fact I've never seen 
anything remotely like it.


James
_______________________________________________
Homestead list and subscription:
http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/homestead
Change your homestead list member options:
http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/options/homestead/cayadopi%40yahoo.com
View the archives at:
http://lists.ibiblio.org/pipermail/homestead





      


More information about the Homestead mailing list