This is my first year of gardening and I have planted some pumpkins, butternut squash, snake gourds and "fancy mix" decorative gourds. All of them are starting to flower now, just male flowers still, but I'm waiting for the females. But the plants are really small - less than 18 inches and not big and vine-y like I expected. The plants are in full sun and it's been really, really hot for the past couple of weeks. I've been giving them at least 1 inch of water a week.

I think I've read that all my fruit will abort if the vines aren't big enough. Is this something I should worry about? If so, do you have any recommendations on what fertilizer I should use at this point to get things growing?

My average first frost is around Sept 30, if that makes a difference to the answer.

Thanks for your help.

Carrie