Tell me your best-tasting, long-storing winter squash
tcstoehr
14 years ago
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farmerdilla
14 years agoRelated Discussions
RSVP: Tell me about your Winter Sowing,
Comments (31)Patti, I know you have had a lot of answers and I probably missed that along the way, but please describe in exact terms what you mean by "A TOTAL DISASTER". Did the seeds fail to germinate at all? Did they start to germinate, then died off? Did they die when you transplanted them to the ground? Depending on the answer, you should then find the cure. If they all failed to germinate, then maybe the seeds were old / not viable. If they germinated, but then died down, maybe the ventillation slits were not big enough? Or you opened the lids too early in the year and a blast of cold did them in? If you transplanted them to the ground and they died afterwards, could it be we are talking about plants that don't like to be transplanted (poppies, etc.) and they died of shock? Or were eaten by the slugs? (happens with my lupines *every single time*, sigh...) I'm not familiar with ws in a climate as cold as yours, but I think it's important you identify the root cause of the problem and fix it before you try again, so as to avoid being discouraged. I have been wsoing for about 4 years now with varying degrees of success, but overall my impression is that the method works very well, especially for perennials, shrubs and trees. I have started crape myrtles, vitex and a birch tree, plus herbaceous perennials, via this method with success. Until I discovered wsowing I no longer bothered to sow anything, as direct sowing is very iffy in my garden and either the slugs, snails or birds destroyed all that was sowed. Wsowing does give me a lot more control about what I sow. The only thing that is not so good for my particular situation is the fact that by the time seedlings are good to go in the ground we are already having hot and dry weather, which sometimes prevents them from performing as good. As a rule of thumb which I discovered by trial and error, I now tend to avoid planting anything in the ground from May to September, even nursery bought plants. I find that our long dry Summers stress plants beyond belief and many struggle to establish and die. As WSowing usually takes a while to grow seedlings to an acceptable size before the end of April, I will occasionally loose a plant if I plant it out later than that. But in my view this is not a failure of the method, it's a characteristic of my climate which I have learnt the hard way... Hope you have success with your WSowing this year. Eduarda...See Morestoring winter squash...
Comments (7)Hello groall, Regarding your comment about something to take some of the moisture out of the air and maintain the temp, a few years ago, I was raising tropical fish and had so many fish tanks running in the basement that I had to do something about the humidity (>75%, sometimes 85%). I bought a dehumidifier, which, over the course of several months, brought the humidity down to 30-40% or so. They do emit a fair amount of heat as well. The drawback (for me, anyway) was the jump in the electricity bill. It's pretty easy to figure out whether you can stomach the cost. In case someone doesn't know, just multiply the wattage of the unit by the number of hours a day you expect it to run, multiply that by the number of days in the month, multiply that by your utility's electric rate and divide by 1,000. Example: 800 watts x 12 hours a day x 30 days x $0.0982 per kWh ÷ 1,000 = $28.28 per month. I don't know, of course, but I wouldn't think you'd be faced with removing as much humidity as I was. (My bill ran an extra $100 a month.) I was advised on the fish forum where I posted that I would have been better off if I'd used a good exhaust fan (something like 100 cu ft/minute). Hope that helps, and good luck with your squash-keeping schemings....See MoreWinter Stored butternut squashes
Comments (2)Glenda I love the way winter squashes get sweeter as they are stored, which occurs because enzymes are converting the starches back to sugars. After a very wet year in which the harvested squashes feel "too heavy" (compared to how a given variety usually feels in a normal year) or the texture is too watery, both the taste and texture of those squashes will improve as they sit there in storage and 'age'. Of course, there's a point at which they sit too long in storage and start to spoil (and even can begin to ferment). If you keep an eye on your overwintered squashes as the months go on, you'll begin to notice a very slight change in their skin color. This is a sign they're approaching the 'point of no return' and are about to start spoiling. When this happens, if you have several left you still can save them by processing them into puree and freezing it. Here where I live, I've had Seminole pumpkins last at least 8 months and sometimes longer and I've had Turk's Turban last 12-18 months in a dry year where humidity overall stayed lower than usual. The Turk's Turbans weren't even in a particularly good storage area like a tornado shelter or unheated pantry---they were sitting on a shelf in the insulated but unheated barn/garage. Dawn...See MoreSummer Squash Evaluations (and winter squash)!
Comments (5)I ate my first spaghetti squash last week. I'm going to try to grow some next year. I saw seeds for single serving size squash at Park Seed, and since there are only 2 of us, that sounds like a good idea, since the bowl I tried reheating was not great. We sliced it in half, scooped the seeds put garlic & butter in it and popped it in the oven. Next time, I won't put the butter on before cooking. It seemed to make it mushy. Other than that, I really liked it. Next time, we'll cook it plain, add garlic, butter and parmesan cheese, then pop it back in the oven for a minute to melt the parm. I cooked the seeds too, like pumpkin seeds, but I cooked them in the frying pan instead of the oven, just to try it. They were good too. I planted my zucchini too close this year (to each other, and to everything else). Next year, it's not going in the raised bed. It's getting some space of it's own. Of course like a dope, I thought it was a vining plant. I've only grown it once, and that was several years ago. I just though - zucchini is squash, squash grows on vines... Lesson learned... We did get some very good zuchs though. About one a day for several weeks. My potatoes were looking great until I left town for a couple weeks. DH overwatered them. They got hit when the sprinkler system came on, and he didn't realize it. As they yellowed, he watered them more, thinking they were dry. I salvaged a few that hadn't rotted. My carrots were less than stellar. I grew Danvers half long I think. They weren't sweet at all. All in all though, the new raised beds I built this spring produced by far the best garden we have ever had. DH didn't want me to garden this year (first year in the house, too much work he thought, so I built it while he was gone to TX for 2 weeks). I had 80 square feet this year. Next year I'll have about 200, plus a raspberry patch. DH is happily helping me this time : )...See More
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