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Danvers, MA

This is my first attempt growing giant pumpkins and I got a late start. My plants still seem to be mostly growing upwards on the main stem. The primary vines are not resting on the ground yet they are still supporting themselves at 2-1/2 feet across.
At what point am I supposed to trim the number of primary vines? Should I do it now to encourage growth in my preferred direction of growth? Or will it be too much of a shock for the plant?
I am having a lot of fun with how HUGE some of the leaves are getting each day.
Thanks!

7/16/2007 7:35:17 AM

Santa Cruz, CA

There is only one primary or main vine on the pumpkin plant. The vines that tee off the main vine are called secondaries. The ones that tee off the secondaries are called tertiary vines. All tertiary vines need to be trimmed off. They will just make a mess and zap the plants energy. They are not needed in the growth process.

Growers trim secondaries in many different ways. Some keep all secondaries, some trim off every other one and some trim as needed if the secondaries are crowded for example. If your pumpkin vine is not growing in the direction you need it to, slowly move it(an inch a day-only in the warm part of the day)until it corrects its direction holding it in place with bamboo stakes or some sort of support. Good luck and hope this info helps!

7/16/2007 12:14:08 PM

Danvers, MA

OK, very helpful. So let's say I decide to trim every third secondary, do I have to catch them right away? If a secondary already has a 12" leaf on it can a still trim it off or is it too late?

7/16/2007 6:52:21 PM

Santa Cruz, CA

If my plan was to trim every third secondary I would trim them early (just as they start out from the main vine)so the plant wouldn't put so much energy into making the vine. If they are mature secondaries you can still prune them but if you are taking more than one off I might do the pruning in a few days to let the plant get ajusted. I pruned a secondary off today because there really wasn't room for it to grow without being too crowded. The vine was about 3 feet long and had 12" and smaller leaves. Let's see what other growers would do too. If your secondaries aren't too crowded you might want to leave them on.

7/16/2007 7:42:09 PM