1. Diseases
Powdery mildew: a white powder-like bacteria, is the most common disease problem. Powdery mildew thrives in hot, humid weather, just as your pumpkin is really getting big. Plant disease spreads rapidly, and will quickly kill the plant. Downy mildew first shows itself as yellow or light green patches on your leaves. The bottom of the leaves will have a gray fuzzy mildew developing. These patches will turn black and the leaf will die.
Symptoms of powdery Mildew on pumpkin leaves and leave bottom.
Bacterial Wilt:- This disease is evident by a wilting and browning of the leaves. Sometimes the leaves will firm up at the end of the day, only to repeat itself the next morning, and get worse each time.
Pictures which highlight the symptoms of Bacterial Wilt on pumpkin
Disease prevention
The best defensive measures to help avoid this and other disease problems include:-
Water only in the morning or during the day. Avoid late afternoon and evening. Powdery Mildew and other diseases thrive in humid weather. Watering at night adds fuel to the fire. When you water in the morning, the sun quickly dries the leaves. Watering at night leaves moisture on the leaves for the entire evening and early morning period. On warm nights, wet leaves are an ideal growing place for Powdery Mildew.
Water only to the roots and vines: If you apply water with a soaker hose, the leaves do not receive the additional moisture that promotes growth of diseases. Place the soaker hose facing down. This also minimizes water on the leaves.
Apply sprays to control diseases before they get started: A fungicide disease spray can save the pumpkin crop from this problem. Start applying disease control sprays early and before disease occurs. If your pumpkin patch is already infested, apply it right away. If caught soon enough, the plants should recover. Although affected leaves will not look any better. Plant disease can occur on the top and bottom of leaves, on the leaf stem and on the vines. Apply fungicide to all parts of the plant.
Remove diseased plants from the garden. Do not turn diseased plants into the soil or compost them. Diseases can over-winter either in the soil or in your compost pile. It then re-infests this years’ crop.Compost piles sometimes do not get hot enough to kill bacteria. Toss diseased plants out in the trash, or send them to your local lawn waste re-cycling center.
2, Pests
The most common pests on pumpkin fields are:-
Rabbits: Rabbits like the tender leaves and growing tips, as well as new, small fruits. They are controlled by hunting, trapping, repellents and fencing or pest netting.
Mice and Moles: these pests burrow under the planting field, disturbing the roots. Mice and Moles can be controlled by traps and rat/mouse poisons.
Squirrels and Chipmunks: Squirrels and Chipmunks attack pumpkin seeds. They gnaw through the pumpkin fruit and extract the seeds. Hot pepper sprays should keep them away from ripe fruit. Spray often, and after each rain. Squirrels and chipmunks can be controlled by traps and poisons.
Woodchuck:- Their diet includes tasty, ripe (and almost ripe) fruit. Hunting and trapping are your only effective methods of controlling woodchucks.
We have other four main pests:
Cucumber beetles, four line bugs, squash beetles and aphids.
Striped Cucumber Beetles: They are very bold, can be very prolific and do a lot of damage in a short period of time. Their favorite things to munch on are new bright yellow blossoms and leaves.
Striped Cucumber Beetles eating young pumpkin leaves
Four Line Beetles: they eat the plant tissue and can kill young plants.
Squash Bugs: they look like they are wearing mini armor and have a shield shape on their backs. They are usually a grayish black color with orange edges. They can dart and hide really quickly.
Aphids: the first indication you may have of an infestation is that the tender young leaves start curling. Upon close inspection you will see thousands of these tiny insects sucking the sap from the back side of the leaves. They can do a lot of damage to female blossoms too, and decimate the emerging fruit.
For aphid control in a small garden you can use a strong spray of water. It dislodges the aphids and somehow disrupts their organized ravaging campaign. This intermission usually gives our lady bugs a chance to catch up.
If you have a small garden you can control most beetles and larger bugs by picking them off the vines one by one and dropping them into a coffee can or jar filled with soapy water and ammonia.
Aphids on pumpkin blossom and leaves
To help lower populations, in the fall we compost or till under plant material so the beetles don't have a protected spot to over-winter. We also keep our fence lines clean and weed populations hoed or mowed. We plant rows of sunflowers near the pumpkin patch to work as an attractant crop. We time it so the sunflowers bloom a little in advance to the pumpkins. The cucumber beetles flock to the bright yellow sunflower heads. If the population is low they will tend to stay on the sunflowers and you won't see a lot of damage to your pumpkin crop.
You may have to resort to a pesticide. We try to use eco friendly organic products such as those made by Dr. Earth
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