#cucurbita

[jillraggett]

Plant of the Day

Thursday 31 October 2024

A display of autumnal pumpkins at the Royal Horticultural Society Garden Hyde Hall, Essex, showing the huge diversity of cultivars in Cucurbita pepo.

Jill Raggett

[los-plantalones]

🎃 autumn gourds.

[cofiifii]

igdkufugxbk kvufzu

[botaniqueer]

New harvests!

- A pretty zucchini! This one is Cucurbita pepo ‘Pantheon F1’

- Capsicum pubescens! A lesser known species of pepper that grows around the Andes and are able to tolerate cooler and shadier conditions than other peppers. This one’s seed packet was labeled “Hairy Bolivian Pepper, red” I think? I also have another variety of C. pubescens called Brown Rocoto growing. I’ve been trying to grow this species for a while but kept botching them and this is the first time I’ve gotten ripe fruit! They’re apparently more temperamental than regular peppers starting out.

They’re also weird in that they have hard black seeds that other nightshades don’t commonly have! They’re also a little “meatier” in texture than other peppers. I took a small nibble of a raw one and my mouth definitely also burned quite a bit for the next 15 minutes or so. :P

[crudlynaturephotos]

[coffeenuts]

[mashounen2003]

Some time ago (I can't remember exactly when), we ate a butternut squash (Cucurbita moschata, aka "anco pumpkin", by far the most common variety of pumpkin here) and buried a few seeds in a corner of our backyard. It germinated and grew quite a lot, some flowers appeared and were fully open yesterday, and now all the flowers started to close again but two of them look like this.

We might get some nice homegrown pumpkins from this.

[ylliasbell]

[vigorous-botanist]

Poured out an old bag of seed mix with climbing annuals when my hornbeam hedge died. Look at 'em!

[botanyone]

Can unexpected changes happen in the process of plant domestication?

Today, to feed ourselves, we just need to go to the nearest supermarket and select the fruits and vegetables of our choice. But have you ever imagined how hard the food search was for our ancestors? Well, this process, which for us is practically unconscious, was costly for a long time for them, who not only needed to actively hunt and search for plants but also identify what was actually…

[jillraggett]

Plant of the Day

Thursday 12 September 2024

The cultivar Cucurbita pepo 'Solara' (courgette, zucchini) has a compact, bushy tendril-free habit and here is being given additional protection by the use of cold frames. The yellow skinned courgettes are produced over a long period from July to October.

Jill Raggett

[los-plantalones]

secret squash stash 🎃

[smudgingpumpkins]

Pumpkin head.

[botaniqueer]

When you sow everything too early (yet again) and you wind up with squash blossoms. Also, bonus immature zucchini ovary that wasn’t pollinated (no bees or wasps in my apartment unfortunately:P) so I popped it in my mouth.

I don’t expect them to be able to do this!! They’re just hanging out in small nursery planters.

[crudlynaturephotos]

[coffeenuts]