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| Hi. I am planning my garden for the year, and in order to avoid as much battling of the squash bug brigade as possible, I am hoping to plant a variety or varieties of squash that the squash bugs don't like. I read on the internet that butternut is fairly good, so I plan to grow that, but I also read that Tan Cheese squash, which looks kind of like a pumpkin, is also good. I can't find them at my regular seed places. Where can I find them? Do they taste good, and do they store well?
I hope someone is out there who can answer at this very early time of year! : ) |
Follow-Up Postings:
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- Posted by booberry85 z5NY (becky@leadsafe.us) on Thu, Jan 15, 09 at 7:05
| C. Moschata squashes are suppose to have good bug resistance. These are squashes like Butternuts, flat or cheese type pumpkins like Long Island Cheese and Neck Pumpkins. I still had squash bugs on my butternuts last year, but they didn't damage them. They did get my acorn squash though. The acorn squash was planted next to the butternuts. |
Here is a link that might be useful: C. Moschatta
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- Posted by farmerdilla (My Page) on Fri, Jan 16, 09 at 10:47
| The resistance is to the squash vine borer, not to the squash bug. The butternut group in general is a hard vine squash, that the SVB avoids. There are a number of cultivars in this group that that are flat like a wheel of cheese and are therefore called cheese pumpkins. All of them ripen to some shade of tan, but it may be close to offwhite or as dark as Terra Cotta. They do store pretty well and are generally considered the best flavored of the winter squashes. One that I grow, Beung Carn  |
Here is a link that might be useful: Tan Cheese
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- Posted by kellygirrl z5 !A (My Page) on Sun, Mar 1, 09 at 14:00
| This is what I've come up with so far, trying to learn what I can grow w/o fighting anybody. Hope some usefulness justifies its length. :) Anecdotally, some local CSA growers state that mexican sour gherkin (Melothria scabra) is disease free and very productive. I have read that online, as well. Eat like cucumber. Smaller fruit, so a little more work for the CSA, but worth it. Trick is to pick ripe, and not too ripe, for good flavor. Also they say it needs to be weeded and babied a bit to get going, then it will take over your fence/trellis happily with great reward and attractiveness. Black futsu winter squash has no problems for them, they sing its praises. I thought zuchetta/trombocino/serpente di sicilia was resistant, but the growers I was talking to said they are super productive for a good stretch, but then succumb like rest. They use pyrethrine sometimes, and that works. Covering with row cover until flowering also helps with bugs. (see fedco link below) I grow bottle gourds (Lagenaria siceraria as far as I know) up my fruit trees (fun!) and they do really well, no problems, and relatively productive if I start and plant early enough, like maybe 20 gourds. If I picked them young, maybe they would produce more? Supposedly tasty at younger stages, but I didn't know that before so I can't say. Guess high up a tree isn't for casual summer long picking, anyway. Hmmm. And not all Lagenaria siceraria are edible according to one source, so one should maybe be sure. All three of those are available (and listed as edible) @ rareseeds.com. More things @ rareseeds I assume or found to be resistant: Things rareseeds list as resistant: At Fedco, do a search on "resistant", get another list. another list of cukes rated for resistance to various things: http://vegetablemdonline.ppath.cornell. … Table.html I know there's more! |
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- Posted by fernisland (My Page) on Sat, Mar 7, 09 at 20:32
| Territorial Seed Co. sells Long Island Cheese seed. This squash looks like a sort of flattened, light-colored pumpkin; it has very thick fine-grained meat. I am trying it a second year -- last year we had such a cold wet spring & non-summer here in the Pacific NW that my one plant only matured one squash. Can't comment on how well it stores, because we made it into pies. We had no bugs. Maybe it was too cold for them. |
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- Posted by someguyinmaine (My Page) on Sun, Mar 15, 09 at 5:50
| If you don't mind using sprays, spray the squash vines in the afternoon/early evening after the blossoms have closed with a fruit insect spray, such as sevin. Sevin isn't labeled for Squash Vine Borer, but it works quite well. If you get diseases on your squash, you might want to use a general purpose fruit spray instead that has sevin as one of the ingredients. I have known people that wouldn't hesitate to drench an apple tree with sprays every week, but for some reason would never think of spraying their squash, even though squash gets many of the same bugs and diseases. |
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