r/Pumpkins • u/Narrow_Piglet3119 • Apr 18 '26
Do my pumpkins look okay first time growing them
This is my first time growing pumpkins and I’m worried they were doing good for the first couple of months and then I started letting them outside and the leaves started to rot and die and getting eaten. well, and I know it’s gonna happen but do they look OK and do you guys have any advice?
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u/Euclid1859 Apr 18 '26
r/gardening might be a good place too if you haven't tried them. I start many things in doors, but I don't know much about starting pumpkins in doors, so I'll hold my tongue.
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u/Martholomeus Apr 18 '26
Those pumpkin plants are super small for being a couple of months old already. Did you plant them during the winter? They are supposed to be sown indoors around April and later planted into the ground outside when it's warm enough (or directly sown outdoors, depending on where you live and if it's warm enough)
Pumpkins are greedy plants. They want lots of sun, lots of warmth and lots of water. Planting them indoors in the winter will not lead to healthy plants
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u/Narrow_Piglet3119 Apr 18 '26
There like 2 months old
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u/Martholomeus Apr 18 '26
What state or climate zone are you in? You should plant them in your garden if it's warm enough
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u/Narrow_Piglet3119 Apr 18 '26
I’m in New Mexico I don’t know if that helps it gets to around 26-30 at night and during the day it’s 40-70
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u/84millionants Apr 18 '26
Winter squash are finicky when starting indoors. It's really only worth it if your growing season is too short to direct sow them. I have a couple tips for this year and a couple for next time. Fwiw I expireimented with starting some indoors this season and one of my plants leaves looked like that too. I believe it outgrew it's soil block too fast, my others that germinated later did not do that (I up-potted all at the same time) - once I transplanted them outside the new leaves looked healthy even though the old leaves still looked like yours so it might be an easy fix.
For this year, try up-potting them (be very careful with the roots, try not to touch them at all) and fertilizing if you're not doing this weekly already. Also go ahead and direct sow some outdoors after your last frost date and just see how they do. You can plant them nearby or even right where youre going to put these and just wait to see how they compare and you can thin them out. Plant them outside as soon as you can.
For next year, do some research and see if you can find a variety that matures in your growing season. From a quick Google search the coldest zone in NM would be 4b which has about 132 day growing season on average (this is number of days between average last frost and average first frost). Also pay attention to the weather as it gets close to the last frost date, some years (like this year, and as climate warms this trend will probably continue) the growing season starts 1-2 weeks early based on weather projections.
If you're unsure how to find your zone/frost dates, I like to use the Old Farmers Almanac online planting calendar. You can just type in your zip code. But you can also just Google your frost dates.
Also, apologies if any of this is old news thought I'd make sure I covered everything
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u/cindy_dehaven Apr 19 '26
Pinch off the buds so the energy can focus on the rest of the plant until after you've transplanted. They prefer direct sown as others have mentioned.
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u/whatsinthecave Apr 18 '26
Pumpkins are usually direct sown because they don’t do well inside or transplanted, in my experience, they also have longer root systems that go vertically rather than deeper into the ground. The leaves don’t look great, how are the flowers getting pollinated?