How About a Pumpkin Split?

Yesterday was dooms day for Polly's pumpkin. About 3 weeks ago her pumpkin had stopped putting on any size to it and we all figured that it was because it was just too cold at night for it to be growing anymore. So yesterday Polly decided it was time to cut it off the vine and get the official weigh in. Frank made a handy dandy platform sling that he hooked up to the bucket of his tractor so that after we cut the pumpkin off, we could easily get it out of the corral it had been growing in. Much to our disappointment when we lifted the thing onto the platform we found it was no 260 lbs like we'd been figuring. Something was very wrong. After hooking the platform to one of the sping scales Polly had for weighing beef, we found that her pumpkin only weighed 180 lbs after subtracting the weight of the platform from the total.

After taking a few pictures of it with the kids and consoling each other over the bumminess of not at least having a 200 lber we started rolling the pumpkin around to check it out in its entireity. In doing so we found the problem. In one of the creases on the back side of the pumpkin there was a split that ran almost from the stem to the butt of the pumpkin. Not only that but right where it had been setting on the ground there was a hole big enough to slide most of my hand through. I could reach in and start pulling out seeds that were rotten. That was the reason it was so light... it had lost all its solidness and bugs were eating it from the inside out. We're not exactly sure why it split but our currenty theory is that the pumpkin tried growing around the board we had it set on and the strain on the wall was too much so it just split at the edge of the board. Mace and I are going to get onto Pumpkin Chat and ask around to see what may have caused it to happen or if our theory is valid.

The good news is that even for the problem of it splitting, Polly's pumpkin is still gorgeous. And for our first try at this its still a big pumpkin. The bad news is that with the split, we doing think its going to make it to Halloween. Its already trying to rot and other soft spots are forming on the back wall. But for now it looks awfully cool sitting on the lawn in front of Polly's house and the kids think its pretty darn amazing. My pumpkin is still growing strong so I don't think there is any worry of it being split. Mace and I plan on cutting it off the vine a couple days before I head down to Denver so I can see how much it weighs. Then when I get back I'll carve it with Lane and Gracie and we'll set it up for Halloween.

I have to get my camera back from Polly... we took a bunch of pictures and she's downloading them to her computer. Once I do though I'll post some of the pictures on here and you can see how hers did. Have a great weekend all.