What causes storage losses in pumpkins?

The main fungal plant pathogen that causes rot in UK pumpkin crops is Phoma cucurbitacearum. According to our trials, a combination of fungicide and nutritional sprays can help to reduce pumpkin storage losses.

In 2014, we took pumpkin rot samples from field sites in Cambridgeshire, Kent and Hampshire. We also took samples from a storage site in Kent. We identified the main rotting pathogen as Phoma cucurbitacearum.

We also liaised with growers in the US, who told us that treating powdery mildew in pumpkins helped reduce their post-harvest losses.

Incidence of rot species observed across three varieties of pumpkin in 2015. Comparison between Cambridgeshire and Hampshire

Our next step was to treat plants in the field at both sites with fungicides and nutritional sprays to see if we could reduce storage losses.

If you would like to order a hard copy of the Outdoor cucurbit crop walkers' guide please contact:

Email: publications@ahdb.org.uk

Telephone: 0247 799 0069

This information was written by Debbie Rees, Richard Colgan, Marcin Glowacz – NRI, University of Greenwich Peter Waldock – Growing Earth Consultancy Ltd. Gerard Bishop, Robert Saville, Jennifer Kingsnorth – NIAB EMR.