Pumpkin Shortage?

[Luremaker]

I saw this article in the Toronto Star today. In my area we had the opposite problem. Too dry and too cold this summer so the crop is smaller than average. Thank goodness for the heat in August and September. Only problem is we had frost last week and that killed the plants. Well here's hoping for a better harvest next summer.

http://www.thestar.com/article/700843

 

[dave1949]

Here in Central Maine, this has been one of the poorest and oddest gardening years.

I recorded 11.5" of rain in June, 7.55" in July. Been bone dry now since mid-August. If it hit 90 deg. here this summer, I missed it.

I lost all my tomatoes to late blight. My sweet corn was very slow in coming, I still have ears trying to fill out but the corn borer's are into them. I planted it in mid to late June, it was ankle high (maybe) on the 4th of July.

I don't plant pumpkins every year, mine are okay but late in ripening, still have green pumpkins on the vines and we have first frost forecast for tonight.

There is something pretty about pumpkins, I agree.

Dave.

 

[polo1665]

Also had odd weather here in Ohio. Lost my tomatoes as well. Corn did well til the coons found the second planting. Peppers are still coming strong.

I transplanted some strawberries yesterday and a few of the plants had blooms and berries on them.

Definitely no shortage of pumpkins around here, for sale everywhere you turn

 

[Bird]

The Dallas Morning News this morning has this story about the pumpkin shortage in the Dallas area. Looks like it's going to be OK.

 

[charlz]

My pumpkins did fine this year... with the exception of the mice moved in and gnawed on a bunch of them. They seem to really like the tiny white and orange ones

 

[chrisreedtn]

Since January 27th when i started on the engineering work for the construction of a new grocery store, we have recorded 80+ inches of rain. It has been incredible here. I always plant my garden with the rows running parrallel to the hill, This year I made them running down hill, and still couldnt plant when I wanted/needed to because the soil was mud approx 1ft in depth, for almost a month. I kept turning it trying to get it to dry, then It would rain. The past two weeks it has rained here 11days strait. This year in the southeast has been something...

 

[Bird]

I really hadn't thought about the pumpkin shortage until I saw this thread and then the story in the Dallas Morning News yesterday. But this morning I was in a Walmart Super Center. I didn't ask anyone, but I hunted for quite some time and could not find any canned pumpkin at all. However, they had large (not really big) jack-o-lantern type pumpkins for $3.88 each and then baseball to volleyball sizes for $.78 each.

 

[Luremaker]

Well I finished harvesting my pumpkins today. Plants were all killed by the frost so I thought I'd might as well till up the garden and plant some fall rye.

I'd say we did quite well considering the year. Now I do not actually count the the pumpkins but my Jack-O-Lantern (medium sized) were all ready to harvest, my Howden's (large sized) were mostly greenish orange, not quite ready but they will ripen in the coming weeks, most over 25lbs each. Miniatures, gourds and ornamentals produced lots of fruit. The only pumpkin that was a total bust was my small sugar (baking pumpkins).

As far as the rest of the garden this summer, corn was excellent but very late. Just about everything else was a right off, tomatoes, strawberries, cantaloupe, potatoes, peppers, cucumbers and beans.

It's hard to say if there is a local shortage of fresh pumpkins in the local grocery stores as I have yet to see any large bins of pumpkins in the stores yet.