Pumpkin has long been a welcome guest on the tables of people of different classes: from the poor to kings. Some peoples treated her with reverence, as a gift from the gods, others revered her as a nurse and a storehouse of he alth and longevity. Although more than 7000 years have passed since the time when this plant was domesticated and began to be massively cultivated, it could not only conquer the whole world, but also remain a favorite in the culinary culture of many peoples.
Features of varieties of large-fruited pumpkin
These representatives of the genus of pumpkins become the heroines of newspaper and television news, participate in competitions and get into the Guinness book. Large-fruited giants, which include the pumpkin variety Candy, can reach enormous sizes and weigh more than 100 kg.
Their distinguishing features are:
- thick rind that withstands transportation even over very long distances;
- juicy pulp, which is successfully used in diet dishes and sweet pastries;
- they are not only useful for people, but many farmers specially grow large-fruited varieties of pumpkins to feed livestock;
- maylong-term storage;
- high yielding;
- these varieties are easy to care for.
Important to know: Sweetie pumpkin, like all its large relatives, needs space, so the area under it should be large enough.
Variety description
This representative of large-fruited pumpkins belongs to mid-season table varieties and has long been loved by summer residents. As some of them note, this is due not only to its taste, but also to its minimal care.
Pumpkin Candy (photos are presented in the article) forms one and a half meter wattle fences, on which from 5 to 8 fruits weighing up to 3 kg ripen. This variety has a smooth orange skin with no less bright, juicy and sweetish flesh.
Important to know: a distinctive feature of this variety is that the longer the candy pumpkin is stored, the sweeter, softer and tastier it becomes.
Due to the high level of sugar in the pulp (up to 8%), it is added raw to salads, baked, used to make soups, purées, side dishes, jams and second courses. Juices from it are no less popular and useful, thanks to the large amount of carotene and ascorbic acid. This puts it in line with the best vitamin and dietary products recommended by doctors as special nutrition for various diseases.
Preparing the site for planting
A properly prepared site is the key to a good harvest. Pumpkin Sweetie, reviews of summer residents confirm this, prefers:
- beds well warmed by the sun;
- light and medium loamy soil;
- organic nutrition;
- a lot of space, so the distance between the ridges of plants should be at least 90 cm, and seedlings planted one per 1 m2.
It's important to know: the pumpkin Sweetie, described above, belongs to large-fruited varieties that have some requirements for the soil, therefore, in the absence of the desired soil composition, more and more summer residents prefer to put up raised beds. This allows you not to depend on the quality of the land, eliminates weeds and allows you to create a layer of the required depth for each variety of vegetables individually.
Before planting this variety of pumpkin, the mail must be dug up and fertilized with manure or rotted compost at the rate of 7 kg per 1 m22. If the land is very poor, then additionally 2 cups of ash and 50 g of superphosphate should be poured into each hole.
Planting Pumpkin Candy Seeds
You can plant this variety both with seeds and seedlings. Preferences vary by region. Where the earth and air warm up faster, you can sow pumpkin seeds Candy, and where spring is late with warmth, it is better to grow seedlings in a greenhouse or at home.
Before sowing, you need to select the best seeds. To do this:
- The planting material is tested for germination, for which it is wrapped in a wet cloth or napkin for a day: the seeds that have hatched during this time are to be planted.
- Even if they were decontaminated,additional measures would not hurt. It is enough to put the selected seeds for a day in manganese diluted with water or a solution of potassium permanganate to protect them.
- Hardening will ensure the best germination of seeds, so experienced gardeners soak them in warm water and then put them in the refrigerator for several days, providing a temperature of 0 degrees. During this time, you need to make sure that they do not germinate.
After carrying out the manipulations necessary to protect the seed, it can be sown in the prepared area. The sowing scheme is 1 hole per 1.5 m at a depth of at least 8 cm. Each of them is thoroughly watered immediately before planting and 3-4 seeds are thrown there. If late frosts are frequent in the region, then holes can exceed 10 cm, which will protect crops from death.
When it's time to thin out the pumpkin sprouts, then for this it is necessary not to pull out the weakest of them, but to cut them off. This is due to the fact that all seedlings quickly take root, which are intertwined. Therefore, in order not to pull out strong seedlings along with the rejected sprouts, they pluck out the “weaklings”.
Preparing containers for seedlings
To grow he althy seedlings, you need to fill the selected seeds with water and put in a warm place, but not in close proximity to a heat source so that they do not boil. While they germinate, pots and soil are being prepared.
As containers for seedlings, cut plastic bottles, boxes made of thick cardboard, such as from dairy products or disposablecups.
Since the pumpkin Sweetie has a very delicate root system, in order to avoid injury during further transplantation, in the manufacture of containers from plastic bottles, not only the top, but also the bottom is cut off. It is enough to make containers without a bottom 7-8 cm high, fill them with soil mixture and put them on pallets, for example, disposable plates. In such a container, plants are easy to transplant without injuring them.
Transplanting a plant in open ground
To get the soil mixture of the required composition, you need to mix peat with soddy soil and humus in a ratio of 1:1:2, respectively.
When the seeds germinate enough, they are planted in prepared containers to a depth of 5 cm and placed in a well-lit place. After the sprouts grow up (after 12-14 days), they must be carefully laid and lightly sprinkled with earth.
Important to know: containers with seedlings should be at a sufficient distance from each other so that stronger plants do not cover the sun from weaker counterparts.
Before transplanting seedlings into open ground, it must be hardened, for which it is taken out into the open air during the day, and left at night in a cool room, for example, a corridor or a veranda.
Seedlings are planted in the same way as the seeds, without removing plastic bottomless containers. They protect plants from pests. Immediately before planting, the holes are filled with warm water.
Plant care
Before the foliagepumpkin closes, it is regularly watered and the ground is loosened, fertilizing with liquid organic or mineral fertilizers, but not earlier than 10 days after the plants were transplanted into open ground.
To get a truly excellent harvest, you should know what exactly the pumpkin (Konfetka variety) likes. Gardeners' reviews claim that she responds well:
For diluted and infused chicken manure. To do this, it must be filled with warm water and kept until bubbles appear in it, then diluted with water from a ratio of 1:20. Diluted mullein is also suitable for fertilizing this plant, but it is mixed with water in a ratio of 1:10
Before fertilizing, the plants must be well watered, which will prevent fertilizer from burning the delicate roots of the pumpkin.
From mineral fertilizers pumpkin Sweetie prefers ammonium nitrate in the ratio of 1 matchbox of fertilizer to a bucket of water
Timely watering, weeding, loosening the soil and fertilizing will allow this pumpkin variety to produce an excellent harvest of large and strong fruits.
Collecting and storing pumpkins
To get large pumpkins, the plant needs to be pinched. On the main stem, it is carried out after the ovary of 3-4 fruits, counting 5 leaves from the last of them. On the side shoots, the same pinching is carried out from the fifth leaf, but after the first or second ovary. To obtain additional roots that will nourish the lashes with fruits, they are sprinkled with earth.
The harvest of this variety is collected by the end of autumn before the first frosts andDefinitely in dry weather. The fruits are cut with cuttings and stored in a room where there is good ventilation and a temperature not lower than +7 degrees in winter. In such conditions, they lie without spoiling until spring.
