Small but Tasty Pumpkin Trial

Each summer one Queensland Blue pumpkin plant used to conquer and dominate a complete garden bed in my average-size suburban garden.  This year I decided I was not going to let this happen.  I experimented with other pumpkin varieties that promised to use less space.  Here are the results of my Summer 2014 pumpkin trial.

One Queensland Blue plant used to dominate a complete garden bed and surrounding paths

Great tasting giant pumpkins, but leaving no space for anything else

On 16 September I planted 3 Waltham Butternut, 3 Golden Nugget and 3 Delicata seeds in pots that can be planted directly into soil.  I put the 9 pots in an electrically heated propagation tray inside.

On 28 September all seedlings had come up.  I took them out of the warm propagation tray and kept them inside in front of a window until the weather was warmer.

On 7 November I planted 2 seedlings of each variety, in other words 6 pumpkin plants, in a space that in previous years at the end of the season would have been dominated by just one Queensland Blue.

Six well-behaved little pumpkin plants

The photo above was taken on 2 December.  Let me introduce, in the front row, from left to right, 2 Golden Nuggets, then 1 Delicata.  In the back row 2 Butternuts, then 1 Delicata.

I decided not to hand-pollinate any flowers to see what they would achieve without my help.

At the end of February I cut the ends of branches off to allow plants to give their full attention to existing pumpkins rather than trying to form more.

On 12 April I declared it end of season for pumpkins and brought 12 pumpkins inside.

Here are my conclusions after my first 'Small but Tasty Pumpkin Trial':

Pumpkins sprawl
How big did my pumpkin plants become during the season with me curtailing them just once (see above) in February?  The Butternuts and Delicatas had not gone rampant like any Queensland Blue would, but at the end of the season they all had multiple 2-metre-long branches.  Not what I had in mind.
No, the clear winner in the 'pumpkin sprawl category' was Golden Nugget.

My two Golden Nuggets never became much bigger than this

With all pumpkins nice spread around the main stem

Size and number of pumpkins
In this category the scores were

my 2 Delicatas:                   2 long slim pumpkins

my 2 Golden Nuggets:        5 orange round pumpkins
my 2 Waltham Butternuts:  5 long fat pumpkins

From left to right: Delicata, then Golden Nugget, then Waltham Butternut

In terms of total weight Waltham Butternut produced the most, ahead of Golden Nugget.

Taste and what's inside
The Delicatas had the largest hollow area inside.  Their taste was fine, but not great.
Both Golden Nuggets and Waltham Butternuts had surprisingly small seed-cavities.  I am told that the Butternuts tasted best, but personally I did not notice much difference in taste between the two.

Golden Nugget (left) and Butternut (right) both contained good flesh and had small hollow areas

Conclusion
The winner is Golden Nugget.  If you have a small food garden Golden Nugget is a great little pumpkin to grow.  Golden Nugget plants rise up on their one and only stem.  Pumpkins form along that stem and plants do not form other stems that 'wander off' in all directions.  The quality of this pumpkin is worth the small space it takes.

Ah, but then there was trouble for the organisers of this year's pumpkin contest: Team Delicata lodged a protest against declaring Golden Nugget the winner.  Why?  Have a look at the two pumpkins that came off the Delicata plants:

A Buttercata and a Goldencata if you ask me

Delicata pumpkins are supposed to have a lemon-yellow skin with green stripes.  The two pumpkins on the Delicata plants were the result of cross-pollination.

That was not my fault.  It was the fault of my seed supplier, who must have had two or more varieties of pumpkin too close to the Delicata plants that were going to produce the seeds I got.  If I had had true Delicata seeds their performance might have been better.

If you want to grow more than one variety of pumpkin in your garden and use seeds from them the following year, you really need to put as much space as you can between the varieties, otherwise the following year your plants may not be what you expected.

Next year's Small but Tasy Pumpkin Trial
Next season I will continue my 'Small but Tasty Pumpkin Trials' with the winner of this year's contest competing against international feather weight champion Small Sugar and up and coming young talent Buttercup.

Happy pumpkining!