moved AG

The biggest pumpkin on my place is the vine that grew thru the cyclone  
fence from the neighbors. I am the root cause of several pumpkin  
plants along the Columbia River in the Willamette Valley. There should  
be some happy kids by Halloween. Anyway the plant thru the fence just  
wanted to climb straight up and I keep pulling it down and away at the  
same time as culling small pumpkins as they arrived. I have found out  
how brittle the vines are a couple of times this year but this one  
snapped about 15 inches past a 6 inch pumpkin. The fruit was sitting  
on a gravel driveway along side my house where the grade is 15%. The  
bottom of the fence bordered with decretive cement blocks about 8  
inches with and inch and a half crushed rock. I have been busy putting  
off moving the fruit but the pushing out of the cyclone fence said do  
it soon or else. I dug the crushed rock out from under the fruit (most  
of the pumpkin was on the small cement brick) and I could see a couple  
of minor wholes created from weight and increasing size. I put down a  
2 foot square piece of sandstone cut into the hill to level grade  
about 1% just enough to get drainage and not have water sitting in the  
spots from the rocks. I then made a solution of 10% bleach to water  
with a little Joy washed the sandstone and then the fruit. I then took  
the water hose and very lightly rinsed so the solution would run down  
and disinfect the small holes on the bottom. The broken end of the  
snapped vine is now rubbing on the much larger pumpkin and has marked  
it (but not gone thru the skin). I could tie it back to relieve the  
pressure against the fruit of just cut it off and the pumpkin is then  
the end of the vine.
The plant also has thin brown dead edge that when compared to the  
cucurbit problem solver looks mostly like Molybdenum Deficiency but  
the leaves are not rounded and I doubt that is what it is. I have 3 or  
4 other AG along with probably 30 other squash and melon that are  
showing signs of different problems (5% of the leaves), powdery mildew  
an obvious one and other mildew issues and am wondering what to do. I  
try to not use pesticides and grow organic as the AG's are around the  
rest of the garden. I have really enjoyed silently reading all the  
emails and solutions and problems. I will not be surprised if this  
fruit has an event but until the german shepherds break the vine (I  
also built a fence around it today) or it blows off the vine we will  
keep on it.
I am about to use the above solution to spray all the squash and  
melons once a week leaves and vine trying to have a simple regular  
program to keep a bay the most constant problems. I also think I  
should cut off the end of the vine that is pressuring the fruit. I cut  
some leaves and vines that grew off the main line thru the fence  
loosening up about the last 4 feet of the vine for the 20 inch move. I  
plan to spray the solution on the cut ends
from another post
Seriously, though,
I'm going to keep all the chlorothalonil and paint my stems every  
other week
next year.  Using soaker hoses would probably help, too.  Steve M.
So I will go get some chlorothalonil and at least paint the fresh cuts.
You guys are great, next year it is all soaker hoses.
JD

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