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Anybody growing giant vegetables?

POTAWIE

POTAWIE

This year I have a lot of different giant vegetable varieties I want to grow. So far I have seeds from: a couple types of large tomato, some giant pumpkins, giant gourds, tall corn, and a few large types of peppers. Many of these I received in trades or as gifts so I haven't tried most yet. I did try the tall corn but I need a way to keep the deer, racoons, squirrels etc. away from them:(
Anybody else grow veggies mainly for size? What's your favorites?
 
Ciao Derek-

Wow, I certainly applaud you for trying to grow huge things in our short summers. I go to the Royal Agricultural Fair every year so I know it's possible. Personally, I've never been able to get my pumpkins or winter squashes to even reach market size. I talked to the guy with the prize-winning pumpkin at the fair last year and he said that he culls all of the forming fruit but one on just one vine and babies the heck out of it and feeds it a ton of fertilizers to get it to grow huge. That seems like a ginormous amount of work for something you're not going to end up eating. It's purely for bragging rights really. Me, I'm practical, I like to eat what I grow.

We got some interesting squashes this year on a drive out to the country and I particularly loved Musquee de Province, a very large flattened pumpkin with fluted sides. It's absolutely gorgeous to look at, green and burnt orange, but the flavour really impressed me. It's got very dense, dry flesh and a lovely sweet flavour. I canned cubes of it in water using my pressure canner for use in recipes all year long. That one squash provided us with a case of litre jars of cubes. I have one more squash to use this winter and I have no idea which variety it is. It's again, just gorgeous, a pale salmon colour with white netting all over it. I've really gotten into the non-bright-garish orange squashes and this year I'm contemplating growing Jarrahdale and Triamble squashes. I'll be happy if they get to the size of an average dinner plate.

Good luck with your Big Zac F1, Derek. I grew it last year but the weather was really underwhelming and we only got a couple, not even 2 lbs per fruit.
 
how big are your giant tomatoes suppouse to be? i was considering to grow giant tomatoes but instead i choose some others.
 
Sorellina, there are actually a tonne of giant vegetable growers in Ontario, and giant veggies along with the seeds can be worth a lot of money from prizes and sales. Check out this site, Giant vegetable growers of Ontario.
http://www.gvgo.ca/
As for giant tomatoes, I think 4 lbs is what growers strive for although I've never had anything more than 3 lbs so far.
The 3 pumpkin seeds I received were from a pumpkin just under 1000lbs so at least I have good genetics to work with this year.
 
I tried Belgium Giant three years ago - it is native to OH and was said to grow up to five pounds. The largest I had was maybe 1.5 but it was a really lousy year - we had highs in the mid-90s or higher from the end of July until early September, including three days in Sept. with triple digit highs.

One plant I'm going to try (based on a suggestion in another thread) is Jicama. I can do it in a container (a very large one!) and start it as soon as I get seeds. By October, it ought to be massive, especially if I pick off any blooms.

I know what you mean about prize money and selling seeds from winners. There was a family in Ripley who specialized in cucumbers and pumpkins. They picked one bloom per plant and babied it; IIRC, they fed it with some milk. The fruits were so large they needed to use a tractor to load them.

Mike
 
Derek,

The tomato itself was pretty much the normal red color but the juice was much darker, like pumpkin sauce or maybe normal tomato juice with a significant amount of cinnamon added.

I've got five different types growing upstairs, plus another eight or so in the GH (which is doing nothing these days, thanks to lack of sunlight!). I'm looking for the best variety or varieties based on production per plant, decent taste, suitability to sell to restaurants. I don't have to start seeds until the middle of March and by then I hope to have an idea.

No doubt, Red Zebra will be one and Delicious another. Neither are big but they are very heavy producers and the Zebra makes the best tasting juice of any I have tried.

Mike
 
Are you sure you're growing Delicious? It has the world record for largest tomato, and many people use this variety to grow their giants.
 
As far as I know - that's what is on the packets of seeds. They came from Rareseeds.com last year, this year I got some from Victory Seeds. They are suppose to get up to a pound or a little larger and several did, just not huge.

After reading the link you supplied, I'm rethinking the idea of fertilizing. My SOP is to only fertilize about 2-3 weeks before transplanting, and then once again two-three weeks after they start growing. Since I have some plants to experiment on, and the goal is mostly to see how much fruit I can harvest, I may try something like compost tea one week, followed by Tomato-tone mixed with Fish Emulsion the other one. Not all of the N in the T-T is water soluble, but I can throw what's left over from dissolving it in water to the compost bucket.

One nice thing about this is I can control most variables - temps, lighting, watering. Pollination may be a factor but I've had good luck (when I get blooms) in the GH just shaking the plants a couple of times a day.

Mike
 
Last year I tried Giant Belgium tomatoes, they were suppose to get 4 - 5 pounds, but all I ended up with was what resembled a regular beefsteak. They had a good flavor, so i didn't mind.

Good luck on your super sized veggies.
 
I enjoy growing the large tomatoes. I usually try a few varieties every year to see how big I can grow them, as well as other varieties that are more for production. The Giant Belgiums were not giants for me. They had a good flavor though. I think the biggest I got was 10 oz. Brandywine suddith's gets big for me, about 2 lbs. I grew Big Zac and got some that were pretty big. The biggest one I have gotten yet. Tried to grow Omar's Lebanese but never sprouted. I will be trying Porterhouse from Burpee this year.

Delicious is the record holder, but most people I know that have tried it only got average beefsteak tomatoes. Nothing exceptionally large. Might try it next year to see what I can get from it.

jacob
 
My red delicious plant:

delicious119.jpg


I'll see how big the maters get under real good conditions and with lots of nuits! BTW, the pot is 14" wide but the plant was only 10" tall in this picture.

Mike
 
Omar's lebanese grew well for me, I got around 2 1/2 lbs off a couple toms and that was during the worst growing year I've ever had, and it was grown in a container
 
Sorellina, I tried the Musquee de Province last year. Most of the pumpkins are over 25 lbs, so good for canning. Once opened, you however have to finish them soon, because they start molding after a few days. So, the whole office with us got spoiled with pumpkin.
The taste, and this is personal, but is too mellow for me. I have to add lots of chillis to get any taste. Strange that you say "dry", because I have had a few that split open with the cold, and it was as if someone had pored a bucket with water down. I like them best in a thick tomato/pumpkin soup, with of course chillis added and served with some cream.

Potabie, maybe one veggie that may interest you. My neighbor from Sicily gave me once seeds of a sicilian zuchini. I'll try to poste a picture if I can find it back, but they are like a snake, all over 7 ft long. The following link shows a small one:
http://www.toromagazine.com/legacy/b8bbbb9d-3667-0314-953a-eb6dd49098d2/index.html

I always put the belgian giant too. Max. weight that I have reached is only about 1 1/2 lbs.
 
Ciao gvittman-

I would love it if I could get my pumpkins to that size. I was pretty happy to have found Musquee de Province at a farmers market. I like curried pumpkin soups. I haven't tried them with hot chilies in them yet, but that's certainly an idea.

The Sicilian squash you're referring to is a Cucuzze, no? My Uncle Charlie grows those big snake things. They have a bulb at the end where the seeds are like a Butternut. You have to harvest them while they're tender or they end up tough like gourds. In fact, you'll see that the seeds are rectangular gourd type seeds, not teardrop-shaped like other squashes and pumpkins.
 
Ciao Sorellina. Indeed, this is a Cucuzze. That is what my neighbor calls them. I really love their taste. Starting with the head on Monday, then if the family are good eaters, you get the tail on sunday.
For the pumpkins I always combine corn, beans and pumpkin (the golden sisters). The corn gives the beans something to hold on to, the pumpkins keep the soil humid.
I never tried the pumpkins with curry, but is an idea. How much curry do you add?
 
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