A Few Thoughts on

Growing Squash

by

Dazey Shell

A Few Thoughts on

Growing Squash

by

Dazey Shell

Copyright © 2012 Dazey Shell

All Rights Reserved

Thank you for downloading this ebook.

This book, it’s photos, imagery & contents are the

copyrighted property of Dazey Shell,

and may not be reproduced,

copied or distributed for commercial or non-commercial

purposes without written permission from the author,

Except for mentions or brief excerpts used for discussion.

~*~

For my Grandson, Husband & Sister.

Your love & humor fills my heart with joy.

You all are the best!

Table of Contents

Disclaimer:              4

Choosing the right Squash to Grow              7

Planting:              8

Pest Control:              12

Horned Squash Bugs & Leaf Footed Squash Bugs              13

Squash Vine Borer              15

Gallery of Summer Squash Photos:              18

Gallery of Winter Squash Photos:              22

Disclaimer:

I’m not a professional gardener and I’m not an expert. This is a book of my experiences, observations and basic methods that work for me for growing squash.

There's a world of info on the internet and in libraries that can be very useful to a gardener.

If you choose to utilize any of my methods, you do so at your own risk.

These are the things that work for me, but they may not be right for you or work for you.

What works for one garden may not work in another because of climate, environmental or other factors.

Please thoroughly research any method or technique before using it in your garden.

Use your best discretion when utilizing any method of gardening or pest control.

I mostly grow round or ball squash, but my thoughts on planting and growing them are the same methods that I use for the traditional summer and winter squash.

It's not that difficult to grow squash.  There's a few things that you may want to think about before diving into squash growing.

Don't be surprised if occasionally the seed variety you plant from a pack isn't the variety that grows.  Most seed producers go to great lengths to ensure purity of the varieties, however, sometimes, either through accidental cross pollination or a mix up, a seed or seeds from another variety gets in the package.  That can be a nice surprise or a disappointment.  A surprise variety from a pack of crookneck squash is what started my interest in squash a few years ago.

I called the surprise variety my 'mystery squash'.  I had no idea what variety the squash was. It was orange and round and favored a small pumpkin. I asked about it on garden and vegetable websites, forums, blogs and anybody else who would listen, but no one knew. I found one or two pictures on the internet that were close to what my mystery squash looked like, but  none told the specific variety.  I decided my mystery squash was a Cucurbita pepo and the product of cross pollination. I guessed it was maybe a miniature pumpkin and squash cross.  As I was searching the internet, I saw pictures of the round or ball varieties. It took me all of split second to become obsessed with the pretty round squash.

At the time, 8 ball was the only variety of seeds that I was able to get.  The first year I planted the 8 ball squash, the vines only produced 4.  It was a disappointing yield, but still I was overjoyed. They were so pretty.  It was fun to grow the charming little squash. I was so sad that it had been a really dry year and the vines just couldn't grow or produce anymore than they did.  The vines grew only about 18 inches tall and didn't bush out hardly at all.  But I was hooked and vowed that the next year, I'd buy more seeds and grow many more of them.

The next year, I surfed the internet and bought several packages of different round varieties.  It was a better year for rainfall and I was delightfully surprised at the size of the vines.  They were as big as crookneck or zucchini squash vines and produced beautifully.

Round squash are also known as orb or ball squash and are some of my favorite veggies to grow.  They’re Cucurbita pepo and from the summer squash variety zucchini.  They’re as easy to grow as regular summer squash. They make a nice bush vine.  The summer variety mature in at about 45 to 50 days or so depending on the soil and weather. The winter varieties can take over 100 days to mature.

Round varieties I’ve grown:

The summer varieties: 8 ball, 1 ball, French Round, Ronde de Nice and Piccolo

The winter varieties: golden nugget and small wonder spaghetti squash

One of the most attractive aspects of the summer round squash is that they’ll keep for up to a couple of weeks or longer, whereas regular zucchini/summer squash only keeps for a few days to maybe a week or so.  I harvest some when they’re about 2 to 3 inches in diameter for immediate cooking because they’re more tender, they don’t keep but a couple of days. For later use, I allow most of my ball squash to grow to a more mature larger size and they’ll keep for a couple weeks or longer.  A lot of the round squash of different sizes sometimes lasts up to two months sitting on my counter at room temperature.

The best time to pick a squash is either early in the morning or late in the evening after the heat has left them.  They keep longer when I pick them when they’re cool.

Round squash can be baked, microwaved, grilled, fried, boiled or cooked in the same way you do familiar squash such as crookneck and zucchini. They’re also good for making breads, entrees, side-dishes, snacks, salads, stir-fry or most anyway you’d normally use a squash.

My grandchild has suggested for decoration and fun that we could paint or draw faces on them like pumpkins.

I’ve been growing the round varieties for a few years now. I love seeing them in my garden. They’re so festive and cheerful looking. The round fruits shining in the sun makes me happy. I can hardly wait to get my seeds planted each year and watch the enchantingly delicious veggies growing.

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Choosing the right Squash to Grow

Before you choose a variety of squash to grow, you might want to ask yourself some questions.  There's hundreds of varieties to choose from and it can be overwhelming to choose a variety. Some people decide they want to grow a certain variety because they've tasted it somewhere or have been given a squash that cooked up beautifully.

Ask yourself if you want squash that will keep all winter or if you'd be satisfied with squash that keeps for a few days, a week, a month. Winter squash will keep for several months, summer squash will keep for a few days or up to a couple weeks, but in my opinion there’s another variety that the ball squash fall into that I call an autumn squash because they can be kept for a couple months under the right conditions. I seem to be one of the few people that believes in the mid-variety and I get strange reactions when I mention it.  So, you’re welcome just to stick with convention and just acknowledge the summer and winter varieties.

Summer squash (and the autumn squash) can be harvested when the squash is young or mature. The vines usually produce all through the gardening season.  The young squash are tender and more tasty, but usually go soft in a very short time. The mature summer squash will keep longer. I pick both depending on what recipe I have in mind.

Winter squash usually takes all summer long, 85 to 115 days or more, to mature enough to harvest.

If you're restricted to a small garden or a container garden, you need to be familiar with different varieties and if they make a bush or vine.  Winter squash usually grows long vines and summer squash usually grows more bushy.  There’s squash varieties that can fit into most any size garden or growing area. Be sure to read the packages of the squash to be sure what size vine they grow.

The vine lengths for winter squash varieties that I’m familiar with, can grow from 12 to 15 feet like the butternut or acorn squash or as short as 6 to 8 feet vine like the Small wonder spaghetti squash or the really short 3 to 4 feet vine of the golden nugget squash.  You could run the squash vines on a trellis, a fence or up a tree if you have limited space.

If you're planning on growing squash in a planter or container, keep in mind, that most of the summer varieties, even though they may not make long vines, the plants can get quite large and need to have ample room of 4 to 6 feet between them in a garden.  For container gardening, I would suggest to have at least a 5 gallon or larger container to give their roots room to grow. You can read on the package and see what the plant or hill spacing is for the variety you choose and go by that for what size container and or trellis you’ll need.

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Planting:

After you decide on the variety, you should wait until after last frost to plant seeds or seedlings in the garden.  Some squash packaging says they germinate in 10 to 15 days, but I've found that most of the summer varieties, that I start indoors, germinates and breaks the soil within 5 to 8 days.  The winter squash seeds take longer to germinate though.  Usually the seeds planted directly in the garden follow real close to the time span given on the package.

Planting Method 1:

Planting seeds directly into the garden:

Follow the directions on the squash pack

or if you don’t have a pack, here’s a fairly basic way to plant:

1- After your soil is tilled, make a mound that's about two feet around on top and about eight inches high.

2- Evenly space 3 holes about an inch deep in the top of the mound about 6 inches from the edge.

I use a triangle formation when planting seeds in mounds.

Keep in mind, Squash that makes vines need wider spacing between mounds. Winter squash vines can be 4 to 15 feet or longer.

3- Place one seed with the point side down in each of the holes.

4- Fill in the holes with soil.

5- wait patiently for the plants to break the soil, grow and mature

Planting Method 2:

Planting seeds directly into the garden:

Follow the directions on the squash pack

or if you don’t have a pack, here’s a fairly basic way to plant:

1-After your soil is tilled, make rows

2-Plant the seeds about 4 to 6 feet apart depending on the variety.

Keep in mind, Squash that makes vines need wider spacing. Winter squash vines can be 4 to 15 feet or more long.

3- Cover seeds with about an inch of soil.

4- wait patiently for the plants to break the soil, grow and mature

Planting Method 3:

I start my squash seeds indoors 3 to 4 weeks before the forecast last frost. It's a simple process which require small cups of some sort and potting soil. I use yogurt cups/pudding cups/paper cups etc with holes drilled in the bottom and fill them with commercial potting soil.

1 seed in each cup of soil.

Keep soil moist but not wet.

Once the seedlings breaks the soil, they need a lot of light to prevent them from becoming too spindly and weak. I keep them as close as I can to a bright window in a bright room during the day. I turn the pots at least once during the day to help keep their stems somewhat straight. During the day, if the weather is warm enough, I sit them outside to help harden them off.  More on that in a moment.

I anxiously watch them closely for the first signs of their second set of leaves to start growing. The first two leaves are feeder leaves.  The second set of leaves are called 'true leaves'. When the seedling gets the true leaves, it's stalk starts filling out. It's always a relief when the plants start getting more leaves and start becoming a sturdier.

Seedlings started indoors need to be hardened off by setting them outside for awhile everyday. When the weather is warm enough, about 65° to 70° degrees, I set them outside for 15 minutes and then gradually build up longer lengths of time day-by-day.  I do this until I can leave them out all day long after danger of frost and cold weather has passed.

*Avoid direct sun for more than a few minutes at a time, until the plants have had enough time to adjust to it.  The new seedlings can blister and shrivel and die when exposed to the sun for too long at first.

I wait to plant the seedlings in the garden or outside in containers until after last frost and all chance of cold temperatures has passed for the season.  We wait a week or longer passed last frost, depending on the extended weather forecast.

You can make a mound to plant the seedlings in or plant them directly into freshly tilled soil.

I prefer to plant the seedlings directly in the soil and space them 6 feet apart.

1- Dig a hole deep enough to accommodate the squash seedling cup of soil.

2- Carefully, remove the seedling & soil from the pot/cup (if you used a paper cup try to rip the bottom and sides a bit.)

3- Set the seedling in the hole.

4-Pour water in the hole with the seedling.

5- Carefully put soil around the seedling and fill in the hole.

If it isn't supposed to rain, put some water around the seedlings on the ground or on the mounds away from the stem of the seedling,  try not to wet the seedling itself.

Now the waiting begins for the first sign of new growth of the first bloom and the first bud of fruit. While this may seem like a relaxing time, it’s important to start a routine of checking the plants every few days for any signs of disease or infestations.

Just for fun, you may want to have a camera ready to take photos of the blooms, bees, bugs and squash. Starting a gardening blog or get a photo hosting account, to post your pictures of your gardening efforts and progress, can be an extra added bit of enjoyment.

Keep the squash bed as clean as possible.  Keep weeds, dead leaves or any other type debris cleared from around of squash vines.  Some of the garden pests love to sleep, live and breed in or under anything laying or growing on the ground.  For this reason I keep dead leaves trimmed off and thrown away.

Squash vines have male and female blooms.  You can tell the female blooms because they have a tiny squash on them and the male blooms do not. Squash blooms have to be pollinated to make the mature fruit.  If the fruit of your squash is staying little and rotting on the vine, then it's possible the vine needs some female and male blooms to open at the same time for the bees to pollinate with.  Or if both female and male are blooming and your new squash are still not growing, it's possible you need more bees to pollinate.

In my experience, the first blooms of the squash vine usually aren't productive and the first little squash  falls off.  The reason for this is the males and female blooms aren’t blooming at the same time and no pollination is taking place. Also, sometimes the first of the blooms may be all male or all female.  I haven’t figure out what determines the bunch of male or female to bloom first. After a few days though, they both start blooming and then the bugs and bees make quick work of pollinating and the yearly squash haul begins.

If there's a continued problem with lack of bees to pollinate the female blooms, then you'll need to hand pollinate them by taking the anther of the male bloom and carefully rubbing it on and around the inside of the female stigma.  I've never used this method, so I can't give any helpful hints on how to make it more successful. Hopefully, a quick search on the internet may lead you to helpful information about how to accomplish pollinating squash by hand.

Squash varieties may cross pollinate, but unless you’re keeping the seeds to grow, you won't notice it. If you decide to save the squash seeds and they’re cross pollinated, sometimes they’re fun and tasty like my mystery squash was, but sometimes they're pretty but not tasty or just not fit to eat.

In general, winter & summer squash varieties that are the same species may cross pollinate. Pumpkins and gourds of the same species as the squash can cross pollinate with them. You may want to keep that in mind if you plan to save seeds to plant the next year.

One quick note here: I try to keep the squash harvested to keep the strain off the vine and that seems to help make it able to produce more squash.

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Pest Control:

I generally try to keep new seedlings growing to replant any diseased or dying vines at least every 3 weeks.  This is the way I combat diseases and also squash vine borer (SVB) infestations, but more on the SVB later.

Because squash stems are hollow, the way I trim the dead leaves, is to cut them right at the bottom of the leafy edge of the heavy veins without cutting open the actual stem that connects to the plant.  This way the stem can die back without being a hollow shelter for a bug or pest.  This may not make a difference, but I feel better doing it this way.  Also I carefully pick off the dead and dying blooms and any dying or shriveling squash that has mold or fungus on it, and put in plastic bags to throw away.

If molds start showing up in my squash vines, I try to generate better ventilation and air flow by thinning out a few of the leaves. Allowing air flow will help to keep it a bit dryer so molds may not be able to grow.  This isn't 100% effective, but it seems to help in my garden.

*I'm careful not to thin out too many leaves because it can off-balance the plant and it may topple over.  Also, if too many of the leaves leave it too open the new growing squash may blister.

To help combat against some of the garden pests, I companion plant with flowers and radishes.  Giant marigolds, marigolds, zinnias and nasturtiums are helpful, but has little effect on squash bugs or the squash vine borers.

Whenever I have a squash vine that's dying or dead, I dig it up roots and all along with some of the soil around it and put it in a plastic trash bag, seal it and dispose of it at the local convenience center.  I know the fans of composting may say otherwise, but when you're dealing with possible infestations of squash vine borers and molds, I believe it's best to get the diseased vines as far away from your garden and yard as possible.

I rarely ever use commercial pesticides.  The way I combat squash bugs is to utilize the old reliable hand pick, stomp and squish method.  This method works quite well for leaf footed squash bugs and horned squash bugs.  Every few days, if the weather allows, I go out to my garden and check for them.

There is a product called 'Diatomaceous Earth Food Grade' that I believe would be a help in the garden to control pests.  Unfortunately, like with most all pests controls the good garden bugs will be killed as well.  Diatomaceous Earth Food Grade works by getting into the exoskeleton of the bug or spider and then basically dehydrates them.  We've used this for spiders and centipedes and it works well.  I figure it would work on leaf footed and horned squash bugs and their nymphs too.  It would, in my opinion, work on the adult Squash vine borer, but wouldn't have any effect on the killer grub because it's inside the squash plant doing damage.

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Horned Squash Bugs & Leaf Footed Squash Bugs

Horned Squash Bugs & Leaf Footed Squash Bugs are true bugs: they have a long tube-like mouth called a proboscis to puncture and suck the life right out of a fruit, vegetable or vine. Another identifiable aspects of a true bug is having 2 sets of wings: the outer are hard and the underneath ones are thin.

Horned Squash Bug & Leaf Footed Squash Bug:

Their young hatch out of eggs as a funny looking little spider-like nymphs. They begin feeding and growing from that moment on. As they grow they become white with a sort of shield shaped body  almost like a regular stink bug.

Fortunately, they’re slow movers and I can control these stinking buggers using the stomping and squishing method. I wear rubber gloves, pick the bugs off and either stomp or squish them.

*Important Notice: If you decide to use the squishing method make sure you wear rubber gloves and make sure the squash bug’s butt is turned away from you because they secrete a stream of liquid that emits a nasty stench.

Horned Squash bugs lay their eggs in a bunch or a mass. The horned squash bugs eggs are brown oval and are quite tough. They’re not very easy to squish, so to be sure I get the eggs out of my garden, I cut or tear off the leaf part with egg pods on it and put them into a zip-lock bag.  If the eggs are on a stem, I take a knife and filet a thin sliver of the stem off with the eggs on it, put it in the bag along with the other egg bunches from leaves, seal the bag and toss it in the trash.

The Leaf footed squash bug eggs are brown, almost rectangle shape and laid in a close end-to-end straight string of beads formation.  I remove them the same way I do the other eggs by tearing or cutting out the part of the leaf where the eggs are, put them in a zip lock bag with any other squash bag egg bunches, seal the bag and throw it away.

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Squash Vine Borer

The previous photo is of 3 stages of the 5 stages of a squash vine borers life.

The other 2 stages are an earthen cell that winters in the ground and a pupa stage, but I don't have photos of them.

In my garden, one of the most evil bugs to attack squash vines is the Squash Vine Borer. The adult squash vine borer is about an inch long and really quite pretty to look at. They are orange or red looking with black wings, black thorax and a few black dots down their backside. The female lays a tiny little egg on the stem.  When the grub hatches it goes into the stem and down to the base of the stem and begins to eat it from the inside.

You know the vine has a squash vine borer grub when you see goldish or yellowish crummy sawdust looking yucky stuff called frass on the stem near the base of the vine or the base of a leaf stem. The frass is from the grub sticking it’s butt out of a hole to expel waste. It eats the inside out of the vine thoroughly killing the vine. Then the grub drops out of the damaged dead stem, goes into the ground in a pupa state and hibernates or pupates or whatever it does. It winters in the ground and then the next summer the adult SVB will come out of the ground and start the ugly cycle all over again. It’s a hard bug to control.

After the frass appears, over time and the grub grows and eats out the middle of the vine/stem, the vine will look very wilted and then it'll die totally. I remember the first time I saw one of my squash plants with a squash vine borer, it was a big beautiful zucchini, one day it was healthy looking and I picked squash off of it and the next day it looked like someone had poured hot water over it. I had no idea what happened to it.  Until I researched about it and discovered it was the Squash Vine Borer. I was so angry and still am that the SVB is almost unbeatable.

The popular belief about the SVB is that they’re attracted to yellow and when they fly into a squash vine to lay eggs, they go to the base of the vine where the blooms are.  I personally haven't found this to be necessarily the norm with the SVB in our area, if it was, it'd be easier to combat them with more success.  I've seen them lay eggs high on the stems or in the middle of a runner vine.  I even saw one last year lay an egg on a bud on a plant that was still small and green with no yellow anywhere on it or near it.

I've seen grub choked vines in the middle of a runner at the base of the leaf stem and there doesn't have to be a bloom anywhere near it.  Personally, I think there's other factors that also guide them to squash, maybe smell or instinct.

There’s a few green-control methods to battle these demon-bugs and none are even close to 100%.  The adult SVB are fast and harder to catch to squish, but it can be done. I’m limited to the catching and squishing the adults and scrapping the eggs off if I find them. I also keep squash seedlings started and replant them in the garden when my plants die.  I replant about 3 times during a season.

I rotate where I plant my squash in the garden each year. It seems to help slow the SVB down, but doesn't stop it.

One method of saving a SVB infested vine is to split the stem where the frass is, remove the SVB Grub. Be sure to kill the grub.  Bury the stem and water well.  Hopefully the vine will continue to grow and produce. Sometimes, I utilize this method and it works fairly well.

You can also try using store bought traps for the squash vine borers. They're yellow and treated with pheromones.  Apparently, the svb fly in and can't get out.

Light weight row covers or floating row covers may help. You can either hand pollinate the squash or uncover the rows for awhile in the mornings to let bees pollinate the blooms. But, keep in mind that the Squash Vine Borer could easily fly in during the bee time or come up out the ground if they hatch under the cover.

There's another method to battle the Squash vine borer, but I'm not familiar enough with it to discuss it much further than to say it's injecting beneficial nematodes into the vine that kills the grub.

If you’re fortunate and live in an area where the Squash Vine Borer has only one breeding season and then goes away, you can wait until their season is done and then plant your squash.  I live in the mid-south USA and when they come out of the ground in June,  they breed and lay eggs until the first hard frost.

There is one more supposedly fail-safe way to combat squash vine borers, you could strictly grow the winter variety butternut squash.  As I understand it, the stems are too hard for the grubs to penetrate.

Also, with the butternut squash, the leaf footed squash bugs and the horned squash bugs don't have as much success at poking through the hard skins to suck the life out of the fruit.  But both species of squash bugs don't have a bit of trouble laying their eggs on the leaves. I had as hard of a time keeping the egg pods picked off my butternut vines as I did the summer squash vines.

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I can't think of anything else to say about growing squash except to warn you to be careful because it can become quite an obsession. :)

Gallery of Summer Squash Photos:

Gallery of Winter Squash Photos:

Happy Gardening!

~*~