Grow Your Own! An Onslaught of Pumpkins 

Earlier in the year whilst planning my garden efforts I picked up some pumpkin seeds to try in my little patch of green. I opted for the ‘Invincible’ variant as I had never grown them before and wanted a good chance of one of them surviving my lack of squash nurturing skills.

Oy.

Well I needn’t have worried. After planting six seeds in my conservatory I gifted one young plant and put four more outside (one never woke up). I tried one in a pot, three in the ground. They got regular watering, a couple of babybio feeds and a sparse anti-bug spraying. The one in the pot has grown steadily and sent out two vines and is currently holding an orange sized fruit.

The three I planted in the ground have formed their own democracy and are currently negotiating trade terms with the hoards of ivy next door.

Suffice to say they are thriving. By which I mean spreading, daily, over and through whatever crosses their path. They have covered the back third of the garden, choked out my irises and had a damn good go at strangling the silver birch. You see when I hear ‘Invincible’ I think Superman, I think benevolent higher power that will save the day and keep it’s gracious super strength to itself until it is needed for the greater good. These pumpkins are the other kind of invincible.  It’s funny because all the online info for pumpkin growing suggests that you care for them by fighting pests and watering exceptionally regularly as they are very thirsty indeed. That’s all. No one tells you that they need all that water to power their underground lair from whence their  sentient super computer will soon reprogram the sun and bring forth the zombie apocalypse.  I was hoping for some unique black halloween lanterns and a decent stock of pumpkin chutney for the winter, now I will just behappy to escape with my life and a jar of Branston’s. I haven’t slept in days. Come the evening with the windows open, I can hear the low incessant creak of their creeping limbs, gently extending by moonlight ever closer to their goal of invading my foundations, assuming my identity and then after my inevitable enslavement drinking all my gin, the bastards!!!

I was not ready for this. I was not prepared to foresee the effects of the heat blasts of spring and the downpours of summer and the perfect growth conditions they would support. I was sucked in by the innocuous greenery and tasty blossoms and turned my back on their blooming advancement for a second too long and here I am now, doomed and imprisoned with only the hope that some kind of jack o lantern carving prince will breach their defenses and save me before they offer me up as sacrifice to the Great Pumpkin himself!

Please send help. And a really big pie dish.