Ryan H ~ 2019

Not one cucumber beetle this year here. I've never really seen squash bugs either but have not one cucumber beetle on pumpkin or 8 cucumber plants this year.

That's crazy. Stupid SVBs. I'm glad we didn't have any issues with them. I seen 1 male SVB, but that was it. Even the cuk beetles were scarce. I only seen @ 5-8 of them throughout the whole season. One thing we did have was some squash bugs, but a systematic pesticide spray got them under control.

I think we only applied a pesticide 2-3x this season. That is the least amount we've ever applied in any one season. I really think this past winter's many freeze/thaw cycles killed off many of the bugs.

It was the only plant that I grew this year. Off to the compost pile.

The vine borers even chewed into the pool noodle that I jam between my pumpkin and main vine. They must have no taste buds.

So sorry to hear you lost your kin. Was it your only kin? It still had lots of time to grow. Really sucks losing them this time of year.

We have a spot on our pumpkin that looks like that. We do a little prayer before uncovering it in the mornings. Hopefully it can hold together for another 25 days till Port Elgin.

Ive been sandbagging like the Hunt's all along. Fittingly, it hit 400 inches this morning when I lifted the sheet and found the damage. Would have been nice to see what it weighed in a month since the plant and fruit really looked like the 1625 gantner that was in both sides of the seed.

Sorry for the side photos. Didn't take landscape photos with my phone.

Zinnias and dahlias are all I have left. Dahlias are really late and i have only one bloom so far. More to come if we dodge frost. Last night was too close.

The borers slowed the pumpkin down initially, but it held on to those lower gains for a long time and was still doing 19 a day over the last 5 days. I have at least 100 borer holes in vines that I've seen. Will get a better look when the plant gets ripped out but borers aren't a death sentence at least.

Just blew a hole in my 1694. It was a bad sag line and it was getting worse.

They're growing well. These things are hard to kill once established, even with merit.

So it looks like I somehow have a bunch of vine borers. I didn't think they were this far north, but I'm pretty sure this is them. I now see small burrowing in my main vine which I first thought was sapping from my usual heavy watering. So I have a lot. Its probably the end of the plant unless I can get some merit or any systemic with imidacloprid as the active ingredient quickly. Of course, with the pesticide ban it seems almost impossible. If anyone has some and and can rush mail me some there will be a generous tip for you, ha.

We had one day of rain in the last month. So dry here after the wettest spring.

Day 27 from a couple days ago for 1694

I'm glad you hung in there Ryan. This cold wet weather has put many growers behind. Heck, we couldn't till the patch until June due to the wet soil. We managed to keep 2 small 7x9' areas dry enough to put the plants out in early May, but the the cold temps kept growth rates down. This past week the plants grew 5-6' long, so this might help us get caught up to those in the more southern regions.

Like always, I'm sure you'll still show up with an impressive kin.

Good luck.

So I'm guessing the lack of photo entries this year means most people are frustrated with small plants that are behind due to the terribly cold may and june? I hope so, because I am. The weather flipped to summer this week with too much heat. Very hot.

I almost pulled my only plant about 10 days ago. I was talked out of it with 1 phone call and 1 email. I had the knife out twice actually, stood behind the stump ready to cut. So I stuck with it. I pollinated a so so plant with one of my later pollinations in years.

I'm hoping for a warm November.

I'm only growing one plant this year, but it will have lots of room to roam. Really late spring up here like every where on the north American east coast it sounds like. This is one of my latest plantings and certainly my latest till. Cherry trees are in full bloom and mosquitos and black flies only came out this week. Lots of cloud and cool days and nights. Frost warning two nights ago and Monday night is looking at +2. We'll see how the season goes. My only plant will be last years unproven 1694.

You always want to make sure to kink your main vine every spring. Get that out of the way early.

I didn't send them in but I did save some seeds from the one I grew. I can send you some

email sent