Drying/Harvesting Tennessee Spinner Gourds

15 years ago

Help, I planted a bunch of Tennessee Spinner Gourd seeds and had a great batch grow on our dog's fence. I'm not sure what variety of gourd spinner gourds are, so I'm not sure how to harvest or dry them. I was planning to just treat them like the larger hardshell gourds and let them dry on the vine/fence. Can I do this with the spinner gourds? I live in Illinois, if that makes a difference. Thanks, Sue C

Comments (3)

gourd_friends
15 years ago
Hi Sue C,
Yes, you can let the little spinners dry on the vine. They won't take long, maybe a month or two. You can also cut them from the vine, leaving about an inch of stem. Just put them in a basket so they'll get plenty of air circulation and they will dry just fine.
We are in SE central Illinois, and our gourds, big and small are drying on the vine already.

Jan
suec_2
Original Author
15 years ago
Thank you, Jan.
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farmerdilla
15 years ago
The Tennessee Dancing gourd is sometimes referred to as the spinner gourd because it has been used to the the traditional spinning Tops of yesteryear. If so it is a squash (C. pepo) as are most of the small ornamental gourds. Jan's advice still applies. The shells when dry are of course much more fragile than the hard shelled ( Lagenaria) gourds.