Guest Rant: Sex and the Pumpkin Patch

Please welcome Susan Warren, author of Backyard Giants. And yes, we're giving away a book--keep reading.

When I wrote an October 2005 article for The Wall Street Journal about competitive giant pumpkin growers, I hadn't planned on spending the next two years of my life immersed in that world. As I went to work on the book that followed, I was a little embarrassed to admit that I was committing myself to a project involving giant fruit. Whenever anyone asked me what my book was about, I'd squirm and stammer and end up almost apologizing for not writing about something more serious, like the Kyoto Protocol or corporate scandals.

But I discovered that life plays out in the pumpkin patch pretty much like it does in corporate boardrooms, with lots of drama and tedium, super-charged competition, and even a gender divide.

For whatever reason – some growers like to call it a "sport" – competitive giant pumpkin growing has attracted a disproportionate share of men. I think there's something about monster garden produce that appeals to men's macho side. These are muscle fruit, like muscle cars and muscle shirts. And it doesn't hurt that sex is a requirement of the job, even if it's only between plants.

This male dominated world became a real issue for me as I tried to blend in to the Rhode Island growers’ club that I was writing about in Backyard Giants. Over the years, the growers there had developed a kind of boys-only club, and in the view of some, my frequent visits began to crimp their style. Having a woman looking over their shoulder spoiled some of the fun, one grower complained. They had to be on their best behavior when I was on the premises.

It was a gentlemanly impulse, I suppose. I didn't want to disillusion them with a vocabulary list of the socially unacceptable words I've been known to utter. Nor did I remind them that plenty of women had proven their mettle in the pumpkin patch by setting their own world records. Paula Zehr, a New York grower, was the first person in the world to grow a pumpkin weighing more than 1,000 pounds in 1996. Gerry Checkon set a world record in 1999 her first year growing in Pennsylvania, zooming past her grower husband after he lost his pumpkin mid-season to a split. (Larry Checkon got his matching world record in 2005.) And Geneva Emmons set a world record in 2001 with a 1,262-pound pumpkin in Washington.

So considering how dramatically men outnumber women in the pumpkin patch, the way I see it, women have been beating the pants off men for the last 10 years!

Yet they still have a harder time claiming their due. As I discussed this with different women growers through the year, I came to understand one reason why. It seems that in yonder days wives provided a handy way for some men growers to cheat a little. Many pumpkin weigh-offs have a one-pumpkin-per-grower rule to help level the playing field. That's tough to stomach for growers who end the season with a couple of potential prize-winners. So a few men competitors had been known to bump up their winning chances by entering a second pumpkin under their wife's name. After all, she turned on the sprinkler once a week, and she brought her husband a cold-one on hot days in the patch. That counts, doesn't it?

This tactic was supremely aggravating to competitors who saw it as cheating. And it was unfair to all the women growers who really did do the hard work of growing pumpkins and had a legitimate right to enter a pumpkin under their own name. Yet they still got looked upon with suspicion when they partnered with their husbands.

Sherry LaRue, who grows pumpkins alongside her husband, Jack, in the Northwest, solved the problem by drawing a sharp line in the garden between his-and-her pumpkins. She made sure no one could accuse her of piggybacking on her husband by setting aside her own patch of dirt to grow her pumpkins. And just to be sure, she and Jack never compete at the same weigh-off.

In Rhode Island, Scott and Sherry Palmer of Rhode Island shared the credit by entering one pumpkin under both their names.

As the hobby grows and draws in more people, women growers are popping up more often on bigpumpkins.com, the growers' virtual community. From what I can see, women are welcomed just as warmly as men. But it helps to have a thick skin. Women growers often are teased about wearing high-heels in the pumpkin patch or ruining their manicures. And tolerance (or appreciation) of bawdy humor is a must. Give a man two smooth round orbs and there’s no limit to the number of sex jokes he can get out of it. I won't even get in to the subject of hand pollinating, except to say that pumpkin growers have given me new insights into why parents have such a tough time discussing the birds and the bees with their kids.

Check out the book's website here.  Want a book? Post a clever tale of sex, large vegetables, or round orbs for a chance to win. And go meet Susan here:

Sept. 27, 7 p.m.
Lincoln Park Barnes & Noble
7700 West Northwest Hwy. Ste. 300
Dallas, TX 75225
214-739-1124

Sept 29, 3:30
Brazos Bookstore
2421 Bissonnet
Houston, TX 77005
Tel: 713-523-0701

Oct. 5, 7 p.m.
Barnes & Noble Booksellers - Warwick
Warwick Centre
1350-B Bald Hill Rd
Warwick, RI 02886
401-826-8885

Dallas Arboretum
Oct. 20, 27 1 p.m.
Autumn at the Arboretum
8525 Garland Road
Dallas, Texas 75218

Comments

[Christopher C. NC]

I have noted a similar gender divide in the Garden Blogging world where the women rule the roost. That may be a topic worth peeking under the covers at. A closer look at the dynamics of social interaction in this community of people could be revealing.

Is it possible that Carol's Tiniest Tomato was ploy of some sort?

http://maydreamsgardens.blogspot.com/2007/08/grape-jam-and-yes-another-tiny-tomato.html

[The County Clerk]

And I was foolish enough to think the post would be about large Cucurbita. Gender strife in the garden? No thank you.

[Carol]

Ploy? Nope, just disgusted that my tomato harvest was 'off' this year, so I showed the best thing I had... tiny tomatoes. "When life hands you tiny tomatoes, make tiny tomatoes the thing to have." I did, by the way, read Susan Warren's book on giant pumpkins and enjoyed it immensely.

[Brooke]

I don't think I better even GO THERE, posting a story with BOTH sex AND large vegetables involved. As tempting as it may be to try to win the book...

[layanee]

I read this article with great interest as I just posted a picture, not a great one, but of a great big pumpkin growing in RI. Competition for big pumpkins is on October 6th at Freirich Farms in Warren, RI. Since Susan is at the Barnes and Noble in Warwick on the 5th, will she be attending the weigh in?

[candice]

this is more of a question than a comment. is there anyone out there who knows if each pumpkin is of a male or female gender. my daughters third grade class were inspecting the bottoms of their pumpkins to find that some had star shapes or cloverlike shapes on the bottoms. they seemed to think that this meant that they had either a boy or girl pumpkin. any feed back on this matter would be greatly appreciated.the kid are eager to learn.

[AnneBrygger]

Interesting. There doesn't seem to be such a macho climate in giant vegetable growing in Alaska. There may be a few more men than women, but there are lots of kids (who really seem to be responsible for their own veggies). It's definitely a family affair, though. Several generation, in-laws, siblings.