Last year I was surprised and delighted to get one fruit from a
butternut squash plant I put in as an afterthought (far too late and not
in enough space) so this year, I grew them "properly" for the first
time. I was quite happy with my crop until I read another post on
here...

Anyway, is there any benefit leaving the fruit on the plants by now?
It's cool and the light is going fast, but so far this autumn it seems
like it will be sunny and reasonably dry for a while yet and no real
threat of frost. On the other hand, the plants are a sorry state with
barely any healthy leaves remaining so it's not clear if being attached
to the plants is doing anything for them.

Is the idea to leave them as long as possible up until the frost, or is
it just as well to take them inside now?

Peter

In article ,
Peter Robinson wrote:

Is the idea to leave them as long as possible up until the frost, or is
it just as well to take them inside now?

If the stem is still full of sap and the weather is dry, leave them.
Once the stem shrivels, they will gain nothing. They WILL ripen
further, even picked, if left in the sun (preferably indoors),
though the sun is rapidly weakening.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

On 04/10/2018 22:29, Nick Maclaren wrote:
In article ,
Peter Robinson wrote:

Is the idea to leave them as long as possible up until the frost, or is
it just as well to take them inside now?

If the stem is still full of sap and the weather is dry, leave them.
Once the stem shrivels, they will gain nothing. They WILL ripen
further, even picked, if left in the sun (preferably indoors),
though the sun is rapidly weakening.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

See if you can stick your thumb nail through the skin, if not they are
ripe, but if you can break the skin then they need more time to ripen

In article ,
David Hill wrote:

Is the idea to leave them as long as possible up until the frost, or is
it just as well to take them inside now?

If the stem is still full of sap and the weather is dry, leave them.
Once the stem shrivels, they will gain nothing. They WILL ripen
further, even picked, if left in the sun (preferably indoors),
though the sun is rapidly weakening.

See if you can stick your thumb nail through the skin, if not they are
ripe, but if you can break the skin then they need more time to ripen

Unfortunately, what they need and what they will get are not well
correlated. I don't grow butternut, but grow crown prince, and have
just eaten a late-setting one (as a summer squash) because it was
definitely not going to ripen.

In the UK, Cucubita pepo is the only one that ripens even moderately
reliably. C. maxima (hubbards, crown prince etc.) does in some places
in most years, and C. moschata (butternut) is trickier still. The
others are pretty well hopeless, because we don't get enough autumn
daylight.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

Nick Maclaren wrote:

In article ,
Peter Robinson wrote:

Is the idea to leave them as long as possible up until the frost, or is
it just as well to take them inside now?

If the stem is still full of sap and the weather is dry, leave them.
Once the stem shrivels, they will gain nothing. They WILL ripen
further, even picked, if left in the sun (preferably indoors),
though the sun is rapidly weakening.

That is useful. The stems are still green as ever and they're growing
new leaves at the far ends, though I stopped letting them set fruit ages
ago. I'll leave them for a little while - it looks like there will be a
little more sun and warmth next week at least.

Peter

David Hill wrote:

In article ,
Peter Robinson wrote:

Is the idea to leave them as long as possible up until the frost, or is
it just as well to take them inside now?

See if you can stick your thumb nail through the skin, if not they are
ripe, but if you can break the skin then they need more time to ripen

That's disappointing! I'd have said the skins were pretty tough, but my
thumbnail does bruise them a little and I don't want to press harder.

Peter

Nick Maclaren wrote:

In the UK, Cucubita pepo is the only one that ripens even moderately
reliably. C. maxima (hubbards, crown prince etc.) does in some places
in most years, and C. moschata (butternut) is trickier still. The
others are pretty well hopeless, because we don't get enough autumn
daylight.

Interesting - perhaps I should try something like crown prince next
year. Last year, after I took in my neglected butternuts, I didn't get
round to doing anything with them and they hung around in the kitchen
until March staring at me. I didn't have high hopes - half expecting
them to be rotten - but I was amazed how delicious they were roasted.

So I got blazee and picked one this year in August - thinking it would
be just as good after the summer we had. It seemed ripe enough, but I
was really disappointed how tasteless it was.

Peter

In article ,
Peter Robinson wrote:

In the UK, Cucubita pepo is the only one that ripens even moderately
reliably. C. maxima (hubbards, crown prince etc.) does in some places
in most years, and C. moschata (butternut) is trickier still. The
others are pretty well hopeless, because we don't get enough autumn
daylight.

Interesting - perhaps I should try something like crown prince next
year. Last year, after I took in my neglected butternuts, I didn't get
round to doing anything with them and they hung around in the kitchen
until March staring at me. I didn't have high hopes - half expecting
them to be rotten - but I was amazed how delicious they were roasted.

Yes, ripe cucurbits keep very well - and, from the way they kept and
the way they tasted, they had ripened. The best C. pepo I know of
for keeping is Little Gem (Gem/Rolet), though it tends to be a bit
fibrous when very ripe. C. maxima (hubbards) are more like chestnuts
than the watery C. pepo (even pumpkins). C. moschata is too sweet for
my taste, though I grow Tromboncino d'Albenga as an alternative to
courgettes - it is much more solid and good to use at over 1 Kg!

You can tell C. maxima seeds from C. pepo ones because the former are
rounder, thicker and significantly rougher - watch out, because few
seeds are reliably identified as to species, and I can't guarantee
that some crown prince varieties aren't visually similar C. pepo.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.