MACON, Ga. — Pumpkins come in all different shapes and sizes and various carvings. Now that we are into November, you're probably looking around, hoping to hold onto your gourds for weeks to come.
But, if you just let them sit there, they will rot.
Pumpkins begin to break down because of the bacteria, moisture, and mold they pick up in fields while being grown. But you can at least postpone that process until you're through with your pumpkins. And it's as simple as cleaning and sealing them.
To clean them, you can just use a mixture of water, bleach, and dish soap.
The ratio to follow here would be for every gallon of water, two tablespoons of bleach, and one squirt of dish soap.
You don't want to use too much of either.
Let the pumpkins soak in this solution for 30 minutes. Then rinse and dry them well.
After that, you can seal them with a light coat of spray sealer. You can get this at any local hardware store in the paint section.
Of course, the other thing you can do with pumpkins is turn them into something pretty delicious. According to the Mississippi State University Extension, the two most popular types of pumpkins to cook with are Cinderella pumpkins and peanut pumpkins. Not the big round orange pumpkins that we typically carve.
But you can roast the seeds in those.
Speaking of those carved pumpkins, if you want to hang onto those a little longer, you can use petroleum jelly on the carving. Now, the pumpkin is carved, after all, so the rotting process can not be slowed as much as an uncarved pumpkin. You're most likely only adding a few days before it starts to cave in.
Lastly, no matter what you do, keep the pumpkins out of direct sunlight! That should be easier into November as the sun angle continues to drop.