how to preserve pumpkins

[Anonymous]

I've tried spraying pumpkins picked from the patch with bleach and vinegar solutions but they don't seem to work. Not sure what I'm doing wrong, but they always rot within a week or two. Want to make them last until Halloween! Any advice? TIA!

[Anonymous]

Are they in the sun?

[Anonymous]

Don't carve them up until just before Halloween. Uncarved, they should last a month on the porch.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Don't carve them up until just before Halloween. Uncarved, they should last a month on the porch.

As long as the squirrels don’t start eating them which is what always happens to us and our neighbors.

[Anonymous]

I keep mine indoors and out of the sun until right before Halloween. If we put them outside, even uncarved, the squirrels will get them.

I always buy a couple big ones early, because the big ones sell out at places like Costco and Home Depot and I don't want to pay farmers' market prices. Sometimes we'll buy a smaller one right before carving time.

[Anonymous]

I buy those fancy pumpkins from Trader Joe’s and they last for a couple of months on my west-facing porch that gets a lot of sun. I don’t do anything special to them. The only times they go bad quickly is if a critter nibbles on them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I've tried spraying pumpkins picked from the patch with bleach and vinegar solutions but they don't seem to work. Not sure what I'm doing wrong, but they always rot within a week or two. Want to make them last until Halloween! Any advice? TIA!

That's odd. They last just fine in the fields in full sun for a couple months.

[Anonymous]

Okay well bleach is alkaline and vinegar is acidic, so I hope you’re not using them together or they will just neutralize each other. Plus I would think either one or a combo would only make a pumpkin rot faster? What’s the theory of action you’re going for?

If you’re spraying something on the pumpkins it should be to deter animals. Pepper or something.

[Anonymous]

They need to sit in the sun to preserve.

[Anonymous]

Does anything work to keep squirrels from eating them?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Does anything work to keep squirrels from eating them?

I spray ours all over with Windex and that seems to work.