Pumpkin · Shuangcheng, Heilongjiang, China
When to plant pumpkins in Shuangcheng
Main outdoor window
10-24 May
The window this page is built around.
Timed from last spring frost
26 April
In Shuangcheng, on your chosen risk.
Ready to pick
8 Aug - 7 Sep
If you plant at the start of the window.
The average last frost. Half of all years are later than this.
Step by step in Shuangcheng
Each window is a range, not a single day. Earlier in the range buys you a longer season; later in it buys you a safer one.
Start indoors
5-19 Apr
Three weeks before your last frost, under cover or on a windowsill.
Sow direct
10-24 May
Two weeks after your last frost.
Plant out
10-24 May
Two weeks after your last frost.
Harvest
8 Aug - 7 Sep
Pumpkins through the year
Against the frost risk in Shuangcheng
Why these dates
If your frost-free season is shorter than 110 days, start indoors and choose a smaller cultivar. Giant pumpkins are a long-season crop, not a beginner one.
Foliage dies at the first frost, but mature fruit tolerates a light touch. Harvest before a hard frost or the flesh will not store.
Seed packets and extension guides express timing as weeks either side of the last spring frost, because that is the only reference point that travels. Pumpkins are timed from 3 weeks before that frost for an indoor start, with planting out 2 weeks after it, and this page simply resolves those offsets against the frost date computed for Shuangcheng.
The median frost-free season here is 162 days, against 90 to 120 days to maturity for this crop counted from sowing. That margin is what decides whether a late sowing is worth attempting.
Also in Shuangcheng
Other vegetables to time
Growing pumpkins in Shuangcheng
When should I plant pumpkins in Shuangcheng?
Aim for 10-24 May in an average year. If you would rather not gamble on the weather, wait until 19 May - 2 Jun - by then frost has finished in nine years out of ten.
When will pumpkins be ready to harvest in Shuangcheng?
Expect to start picking around 8 Aug - 7 Sep, based on 90 to 120 days to maturity from the planting date calculated for this location.
How much frost will pumpkins tolerate?
Foliage dies at the first frost, but mature fruit tolerates a light touch. Harvest before a hard frost or the flesh will not store.