The Patch Post

Prairie stories, growing tips, and reflections from our Kansas garden. Follow the seasons with Autumn Prairie Pumpkins.

Maggie leaning on a wooden garden fence beside pumpkin vines with her coffee mug on an August morning in Kansas, hand-drawn storybook illustration

Do Pumpkin Plants Come Back Every Year? A Letter from the August Patch

My neighbor leaned on the fence this week while I was picking squash bugs off the Seminole vines, coffee cooling in my other hand, and...

Read more →
Maggie on a Kansas farmhouse porch beside rows of harvested heirloom pumpkins and winter squash laid out in a single layer on wooden pallets to cure

What to Do with Too Many Pumpkins: A Happy August Problem

The wheelbarrow did not make it to the porch this morning. I loaded it out in the patch, got about forty feet, and had to...

Read more →
Illustrated gardener arranging heirloom pumpkins for a fall front porch display, ribbed bronze, tan cheese, and dark warty varieties on farmhouse steps

The Best Pumpkins for a Fall Front Porch

The first almost-cool morning showed up this week. It never lasts in early August, by ten the heat is back and leaning on everything, but...

Read more →
Maggie at dawn in a Kansas pumpkin patch holding a mug of coffee, looking over dewy vines - what animals eat pumpkin plants at night

What Animals Eat Pumpkin Plants at Night?

The Kikuza had eleven leaves on Tuesday evening. I counted them, because it was the last thing I did before the light went and I...

Read more →
Maggie kneeling in a Kansas pumpkin patch on a July morning, tilting a ripening heirloom pumpkin to check whether it is ripe

How to Tell When a Pumpkin Is Ripe: A Morning Walk Through the Patch

There is a Musquee de Provence sitting about twenty feet from the back step that has been quietly changing color for two weeks, and I...

Read more →
Maggie sitting on a wooden porch step beside a container-grown mini butternut squash vine climbing a trellis, with a mug of coffee, on a Kansas summer morning

The Smallest Pumpkin Variety to Grow When Your Garden Is a Back Step

There is a pot on the back step that gets exactly six hours of sun and nothing else, and for two summers I ignored it....

Read more →
Maggie saving heirloom pumpkin seeds from a ripe pumpkin at a Kansas farmhouse kitchen table - Autumn Prairie Pumpkins

What Is an Heirloom Seed? A Letter from the Patch

The seed packet on the kitchen table this morning was one I filled myself last October. Same shaky handwriting, same little Dickinson pumpkin sketched in...

Read more →
Maggie of Autumn Prairie Pumpkins kneeling in a July pumpkin patch holding a garlic bulb, planning what to plant after pumpkins, coffee mug and seed envelopes in a basket beside her

What to Plant After Pumpkins in the Kansas Fall

The vines are at their loudest right now. Late July on the Kansas prairie, and the Seminole has claimed the fence line, the butternuts are...

Read more →
Maggie holding a freshly harvested tan heirloom pumpkin in a farmhouse kitchen with a baked pumpkin pie and coffee mug - why homegrown pumpkins taste better - Autumn Prairie Pumpkins

Why Do Homegrown Pumpkins Taste Better? Notes from the Patch

Somebody asked me at the farmers market last fall why do homegrown pumpkins taste better, and I remember laughing, because she said it like a...

Read more →
Illustration of a Kansas gardener kneeling in a green pumpkin patch beside a yellow Labrador, with a coffee mug on the soil and ripe pumpkins on the vines

Are Pumpkin Vines Poisonous to Dogs? What I Learned at Dawn

Cooper found the pumpkin patch before I did this morning. Nine years old, mostly deaf, entirely committed to whatever smells best, and by the time...

Read more →
Maggie kneeling in a Kansas pumpkin patch at dawn, looking at deer hoof prints in the soil beside a bitten pumpkin leaf

Do Deer Eat Pumpkin Plants? What I Found in the Patch at Dawn

There were tracks in the soft dirt by the third row, two cloven prints pressed deep where I had watered the night before. Above them,...

Read more →
Maggie counting small green pumpkins on the vine during a July morning walk in a Kansas pumpkin patch, coffee mug on the fence post

How Many Pumpkins Does One Plant Produce? A July Count

How many pumpkins does one plant produce? There is no dependable single number. Variety, planting date, growing space, pollination and weather all influence the number...

Read more →
« Previous 1 2 3 4 5 … 8 Next »