10/7/2008

by Todd Flory
Salina Journal

With Halloween only a few weeks away and cooler weather settling in, area pumpkin patch owners have been seeing more and more people coming out to enjoy their pumpkins. Charisse Nurnberg and her husband, Grant, own Sunny Side Pumpkin Patch near Assaria, where they grow about five acres of pumpkins. “We first planted a small lot in 2000. Then in 2002, we planted a couple acres down by the road,” she said.

Nurnberg sells pumpkins and hosts groups for a field maze and for various pumpkin activities. There are 68 field trips scheduled this month for her pumpkin patch, she said.
Linda Hubalek, Assaria, who owns the Smoky Hill Bison Company Maze and Pumpkin Patch, is in her sixth season of agritourism and grows two to three acres of pumpkins. She said about 95 percent of the pumpkins sold are used for decorating. “It’s starting to cool down, and people are in the mood to decorate,” Hubalek said. “Halloween has really become a really popular decorating holiday.”

Last weekend, Hubalek hosted a giant pumpkin contest. The winning pumpkin, from Oklahoma City, was 295 pounds, while the smallest pumpkin in the contest was 44 pounds, entered by a boy from Hillsboro. Hubalek said two larger pumpkins were expected to be in the contest, but had to pull out. An 800-pound pumpkin from Liberal split apart, and a 1,200-pound pumpkin from Newton was hit by vandals.

Nurnberg grows giant pumpkins, as well. She said one of the keys is to clip everything else off the vine so that the one pumpkin can continue to gather all the nutrients and grow bigger. She had one pumpkin that grew to more than 150 pounds. The rain over the past couple of months has helped the growth of pumpkins. “The rain at the end of the summer ... really helped them and helped out the crop maze, too,” Nurnberg said. “At the beginning we ask, ‘Are we going to have enough this year?’ At the end of the season, we always have thousands left over.”

Hubalek feeds all of her extra pumpkins to the bison on her farm, letting them roam the patch, picking off the sweetest pumpkin remains first. “We had a good crop this year,” Hubalek said. “It was a cool August, so it was good for pumpkins, but it took a little longer to mature.”

For those people growing pumpkins in their gardens at home, Nurnberg offered some advice. First, pumpkins need a lot of water and sunlight, which is what turns the pumpkins orange. Pumpkins can be picked while they’re green, and can be set in the sunlight until they turn orange. The pumpkin patch should not be sprayed in the morning, as that is when bees are out the most. Bees may inadvertently pick up some of the spray and spread it to other plants, she said.

The patch also needs to be weeded, so the pumpkins have the space and nutrients to grow. Nurnberg said her two older children, in sixth and seventh grades, have done much of the work hoeing the pumpkin patch. It’s work that Nurnberg believes will benefit her five children as they grow older, and help them understand not only the agricultural side of growing pumpkins, but the business side, as well. “We’re hoping this will help put five kids through college,” she said. “And Tate is 2, so we’ve got a long way to go.”

In August of 2002, Nurnberg lost a 3-year-old son. At the funeral, she said, the pastor said that her son always walked on the sunny side of life. Nurnberg knew then what their budding pumpkin patch should be called, and that she wanted it to be child and family friendly. “(It’s) one perfect way to remember him,” she said. “Now he’s on the sunny side forever.”