October - Harvest Time for Pumpkins, Squash and Gourds
Most of the ornamental gourds were harvested today. I left one of each kind on the vines, they looked a bit younger, softer than the others. As you can probably tell, I'm quite disappointed in my "mixed" ornamental gourd variety! The round ones started out green on the bottom half, which was interesting, but matured into solid yellow. The flatter orange type was also had a green lower half when immature. There were at least five vines, which may not be enough for a proper "are they really mixed seeds" test!
The vine on one of the Sweet Meat squash was dead, so I picked the fruit off that one too. Also, one of the Galeux d'Eysines pumpkin (squash) has been dangling on a dead vine for weeks, so I finally cut it free. Its bottom is still quite green.
They make for a very pretty autumn color display.
I referred to the winter squash as 'Sweet Meat" above, but it surely isn't. I heard back from the seed seller and he doesn't know what it is, has never had that happen before... same as I heard about the "Not-Yellow" Brandywine tomatoes being red or gloriously tie-dyed! I was surprised to hear that the seed seller gets his seeds from a "big name supplier," when I was under the impression they produced them from their own "heirloom" garden! The tomato seed seller mentioned the same. So, they get probably thousands upon thousands of seeds, then package them up into groups of 10 to sell? What a lot of work for a dollar or two (with free shipping), especially with having to then ship them out. I now have a "No Buy" list of sellers on eBay. Many of the seeds are right on and wonderful, so it's still a great place to buy seeds.
Don't get me wrong, what grew is an absolutely gorgeous squash. But, is it even a winter squash? Winter squash are the keepers, the store-able, ones. For me, they are the only edible, or even eatable ones! I hate squash... unless it's winter squash and cooked into a sweet (no savories) such as pie, cake, muffins, bread, cookies.
These are growing in two different beds, and all of them look like this. Oblong, smooth, salmon colored with white stripes. NOT Sweet Meat, which is short, squat, and most importantly, blue! If not blue-blue, sky-blue, at least sea-blue or grey green-blue. It's a native Oregonian, unlike me!
I can't even find any Internet photos that look like my squash beauties. It is a beauty too, look at that base!
The vine on one of the Sweet Meat squash was dead, so I picked the fruit off that one too. Also, one of the Galeux d'Eysines pumpkin (squash) has been dangling on a dead vine for weeks, so I finally cut it free. Its bottom is still quite green.
They make for a very pretty autumn color display.
I referred to the winter squash as 'Sweet Meat" above, but it surely isn't. I heard back from the seed seller and he doesn't know what it is, has never had that happen before... same as I heard about the "Not-Yellow" Brandywine tomatoes being red or gloriously tie-dyed! I was surprised to hear that the seed seller gets his seeds from a "big name supplier," when I was under the impression they produced them from their own "heirloom" garden! The tomato seed seller mentioned the same. So, they get probably thousands upon thousands of seeds, then package them up into groups of 10 to sell? What a lot of work for a dollar or two (with free shipping), especially with having to then ship them out. I now have a "No Buy" list of sellers on eBay. Many of the seeds are right on and wonderful, so it's still a great place to buy seeds.
Don't get me wrong, what grew is an absolutely gorgeous squash. But, is it even a winter squash? Winter squash are the keepers, the store-able, ones. For me, they are the only edible, or even eatable ones! I hate squash... unless it's winter squash and cooked into a sweet (no savories) such as pie, cake, muffins, bread, cookies.
These are growing in two different beds, and all of them look like this. Oblong, smooth, salmon colored with white stripes. NOT Sweet Meat, which is short, squat, and most importantly, blue! If not blue-blue, sky-blue, at least sea-blue or grey green-blue. It's a native Oregonian, unlike me!
I can't even find any Internet photos that look like my squash beauties. It is a beauty too, look at that base!
Those are some beautiful pumpkins! I agree with you about the superiority of winter squash. Acorn are my favorite, with a little butter. Though my wife has a recipe for zucchini chocolate cake which is very good, but it tastes of chocolate, not zukes.
ReplyDelete"...but it tastes of chocolate, not zukes." That's the only way I'd eat zucchini, if it tasted like something else, preferably chocolate!
DeleteI've had acorn volunteer in my compost heap a few times after I tossed in the "guts." Of course, they were turned into pies and cakes!
Thanks for stopping by.
I sooo look forward to your update. The salmon color is quite beautiful on my screen, by the way. As an aside, do you have any professional photography training? I can't recall offhand but your pictures are amazing.
ReplyDeleteEither way, please keep up the good work. :)
And thanks for the kind commentary on my blog. I appreciated your confessed confusion on my character's POV and gave you a shout-out with the revision.
Be well!
Thanks for the compliment on the photos! Yesterday's turned out nicely, if I do say so myself! No, no training. A few photos lately were less than I'd hoped and I got out my son's "real" camera to give it another try. The others in the past few years (including these) are just an iPhone. An older one, 5 something.
DeleteI updated the post after hearing from the seller. He had no idea what kind of squash it is.