Elizabeth Maxwell’s garden takes up a cheerful half of her and her husband Glen’s backyard.
The fence posts that surround it are painted vibrant, colourful hues. The shed depicts paintings of night and day. Garden boxes sit in the middle while quaint signs denote which vegetables take up real estate in which area.
It’s a sight to behold, but nothing in the garden can compete with Maxwell’s harvest of enormous pumpkins.
There are three of them, each bigger than the one before. The smallest of the three, and the only one that is currently off the vine, weighs 52.6 pounds. Maxwell estimates the other two are more than 100 pounds each, owing to the fact that she can’t lift either of them.
For Maxwell, the pumpkins are a labour of love, and the garden itself is what Maxwell calls her serenity garden.
“My husband and I have been together for 16 years, but we recently just got married,” explained Maxwell.
“He is unfortunately sick – he’s got heart failure and hyperthyroidism. So this garden, just kind of over time became my serenity garden. My neighbour gave me some paint, and a lot of the paint is mixed with food colouring. I didn’t expect it to last, but it did. It’s hard to be sad when you come in here.”
Excitement spreads across Maxwell’s face as she talks about the pumpkins. It’s her third year growing them, and each year has been different. During the first year, she culminated about six small pumpkins. Last year, harvest brought only one.
This year, she had a few tricks up her sleeve.
“I pollenate them myself,” she said.
Maxwell explained that there are two flowers on the pumpkin plant. One grows on the fruit itself – this is the female flower – and another grows separately. The separate male flower has pollen in it. Maxwell said there aren’t enough bumblebees in her area to properly pollenate the flowers, so she takes pollen from the male flower and spreads it on the female flower.
“Another secret is to water – most definitely water,” said Maxwell, “But you also have to feed them.”
Every Sunday, Maxwell feeds her pumpkins fertilizer.
“You have to make sure you give them fertilizer because they won’t grow just from the soil,” she said.
“I don’t know what I could do to get them bigger, but I definitely want to try.”
Her final secret might just be the man upstairs.
“I’m a big person of God. I do believe God was in my garden this year.”
The pumpkins have grown over three seasons – Maxwell started them under growing lights in her bedroom in March. Later, she moved them to her backyard greenhouse before letting them adjust to being outside. It’s appropriate for Maxwell that the pumpkins come to fruition as the seasons start to change.
“I don’t know why [pumpkins] – I’ve just always loved them. Fall is my favourite – I love the colours, the sweaters, and barely any bugs. It’s just my favourite.”
Once all of the pumpkins come off the vine, Maxwell, who has two children, said the family will carve them, and Maxwell will cook them.
“We’ll definitely give pumpkin away. I want to cook them myself to make sure they don’t go to waste. Once I have the puree, then I’ll give them away because people will know what to do with it,” she said.
“These are beautiful. I can’t believe it, I really can’t.”
