[LivvyW]

I have a raised bed 13ft x 5ft and am planning to use it for sweetcorn and pumpkin.  I have grown sweetcorn before, but not the pumpkin.

If i space the corn as per packet of 18" and cover the bed I'll have about 4 rows of nine, 36 in total.

The pumpkin i have is Mars F1, trailing apparantly.  Needs spacing of about 30"  so again if i was to cover the bed I'd have 2 rows of five. 10 plants in total.

Firstly, Is this the right way to work this out. Do i just superimpose the pumpkin plan over the corn plan? Or should i make allowances for having the two veg in the same spot?

Secondly, just how big do the pumpkin plants get?  i thought i heard up to 24ft, in which case 10 plants sounds like i'd cover my whole garden!

Lastly, roughly how many pumpkins per plant?

Would love to hear anyone's experience of growing these two together.

Thanks.

[gregmcalister]

I grew pumpkins last year in a bed roughly 8'x4'. I planted 4 plants although I lost one which was damaged in strong winds.  The plants grew to quite a size even though it was a semi bush variety (spellbound). In terms of yield I only got 1 pumpkin from each plant but that's probably got a lot to do with the constant rain all summer.  I'm hoping this year I get 3 or 4 from each plant.

If you're going to plant the sweetcorn and pumpkins together you'll need to reduce the planting density to ensure all the plants have enough space and nutrients.

[andreadon]

yeah, although pumpkins trail and sweetcorn grow upwards, they shouldn't be grown together.  in fact, sweetcorn is such a greedy plant that you'd be best not to grow anything with it!

pumpkins are on the whole ridiculously easy to grow! (even i can do it!)
because they are trailing, you can intersperse them with most other things (cabbage, beans, etc) as long as the stalk where it comes out of the ground is well nutritioned (lots and lots and lots of chicken poo).

[mumofstig]

I plant the pumpkin in the same bed as the sweetcorn but about 18in away from the sweetcorn roots and allow all the shoots to twine in among the sweetcorn plants. They then share the ground space. you have pumpkins without the growth using all the bed but they are not competing for nutrients as root areas do not overlap.

[Ropster]

I plant the pumpkin in the same bed as the sweetcorn but about 18in away from the sweetcorn roots and allow all the shoots to twine in among the sweetcorn plants. They then share the ground space. you have pumpkins without the growth using all the bed but they are not competing for nutrients as root areas do not overlap.

Thats a good Idea, I planted butternut's with my corn last year but only got 2 of 2 plants , Ill try separating the roots like this this time and pile on the peleted chicken manure