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Ware, MA

I am looking for opinions about pollination. What is more beneficial. Self pollination or cross pollination?

3/4/2013 9:44:05 PM

Menomonie, WI (mail@gr8pumpkin.net)

Depends on what results you want in your offspring. This years pumpkin itself is not affected by the pollination. You could pollinate and AG x buttercup squash and still get the same weight. Now next year you are growing AG mutts

3/4/2013 10:47:41 PM

Rhode Island

if your a serious competition grower and are growing for specific traits in your seeds? you must hand pollinate.

if you just want to grow a pumpkin? and have no interest in future genetics (for yourself or the hobby) how you pollinate does not matter.

pap

3/5/2013 9:06:07 AM

Piqua, Ohio

If you like the growth of your plant and fruit and want to retain those traits self it, if you have seeds that aren't closely related, you may get a more vigorous plant from the cross. Like pap says it depends on what you are looking for.

3/5/2013 3:40:40 PM

Stanwood, Washington

The polination will make no diference in how your fruit develops. 100% of the Pumpkins traits will be from the seed planted.

The polination will effect the genetic traits carried forward in the following generation. The pollination only matters if you are planning on planting your own seeds the following year.

The choice to self polinate or cross polinate depends on what you are trying to accomplish. Usually when people self polinate they are trying to reinforce certain desirable traits in an existing known seed line. So if you have a seed that usually produces big and Orange and you self polinate it, you are increasing the odds that following generations will be big and orange. The other advantage is that if you self polinate and grow a great Pumpkin Like Mr. Lieber did with his 1610 and his 1770, you know for sure that the polinating Plant has great genetics too. This means you have pretty good certainty that your seed stock will have great potential. If you cross polinate the genetics of whatever you pollinated will get passed on and you won't know if the polinating plant is a winner or not until well after the polination has been made.

When you cross polinate usually what you are trying to do is combine possitive attributes of diferent seed lines. For instance you may have one seed that usually produces very Orange pumpkins and another that produces very heavy pumpkins. By crossing them you have the potential to create a seed line that is both Orange and Heavy. Of course you also have the potential to create something that is neither orange nor heavy.

3/5/2013 4:07:50 PM

Ware, MA

Very Interesting information. I am so impressed by all the insightful information and know - how that everyone is so ready to share on this forum! I am getting an amazing education! This sight and the giant pumpkin community in general is very willing to help a newcomer succeed. I thank you all for sharing your knowledge with me.

3/5/2013 8:12:49 PM

Ripon, Ca

This is super interesting to me. I don't know why I had it in my head that pollination would affect the current fruit that sets. It makes far more sense that manual pollination is for the sake of future seed genetics- which makes all of the seed lineage information make a boat load more sense as well.

Ditto on the thanks for the knowledge!

3/7/2013 11:29:11 PM

Menomonie, WI (mail@gr8pumpkin.net)

Hang on for a fun learning experience...with lots of ups and downs. Set measurable goals and try acheive the. Like Get seed to germinate, Get pumpkin to set, Get pumpkin to weigh off. Start all over again and do better next year.

3/8/2013 7:41:18 AM

Stanwood, Washington

Another thing that it took me a while to get is that you need to consider what the pollinating plant grew rather than just what seed it is. This is where we have a bit of a problem with the current nomenclature that we are using. For Instance, I can look at seed and see that it is a 1495 Stelts X 1725 Harp. However, Not all Harp seeds are equal. It makes a big difference what seed it was. If that pollinating Harp plant was the plant that produced the 2009 world record That is a very good sign. However, If it was a plant that produced a 600 pounder that didn't realize its potential you may not be receiving all the great genetics you usually associate with the 1725. I always try to figure out what the pollinating plant grew. Its not always easy to do so.

3/8/2013 8:47:16 PM

Germany

Same thoughts here, C97, but it´s even more difficult, even if you knew what the pollinator plant had produced. It might be the other way round as well, i.e., you may get a seed from a small pumpkin and pollinated by a plant which also grew a little thing, but the genetics in the seed might be awesome. Reason: the pollinator plant might have had issues which you just can´t be aware of (root problem, or just grown as a pollinator in poor soil etc.), and similar things could apply to the pumpkin which had produced the seed...another grower might have added another 300 or 400 or 500 lbs to that pumpkin, sometimes you just can´t know what would have been if...
Example: The 769 Lombardi (1273.5 Howard x self) looks small, but you need to take into consideration that this pumpkin was grown on 200 sqft only. Mark Lombardi grew a much bigger fruit off that seed (the 1157 Lombardi)...on 400 sqft, and furthermore one should be aware of the fact that other seeds such as the 1421.5 Stelts, 1161 Rodonis, 1385 Jutras produced pumpkins of similar weight on a similar patch for the same grower. This background probably makes the 769 Lombardi seed look much more promising than just the knowledge of 769 Lombardi = 1273.5 Howard x self (which tells you what the pollinator plant had produced).

3/14/2013 4:28:15 PM