On Thu, 29 Mar 2012 16:39:35 -0400, songbird
wrote:

is 60-70F cool enough?
For storage? Seems a bit on the warm side (heck during the winter our
house is between 55 and 65 most of the time), but that should be okay.

how long does it take to go from seed to harvest?

I believe it's supposed to be about 90 days. They do well enough in
the climate where I'm at - about 40 miles north of San Francisco. We
get some hot days and absolutely no rain during the summer, but as
squash vines develop very large leaves, the squash themselves are
often in some amount of shade.


Open the first two links below in separate browser tabs, and scroll to
the bottommost image of each (there's only two images on each page),
and switch between the tabs -- that's just _10_ days of growth.
You'll also note that the topsoil is DRY. While I drip irrigate much
of my garden, most of these were simply done in small 'wells', filled
with shredded straw as a mulch (when the plants are young) - see the
"berminator" link for how I make them (prior year had been done by
inverting a large terra cotta pot and pushing soil up to it, but the 5
gallon bucket with the bottom cut out works really well.

http://www.professional.org/snaps/in...ning/20100903/
http://www.professional.org/snaps/in...ning/20100913/


http://www.professional.org/snaps/in...05_berminator/


we get pretty long days here (mid-michigan). if the
harvest date is into the fall far enough then the
storage temp wouldn't be too hot, but if they are
ready in late August we might still get pretty
high temperatures.

Then you plant them a bit later, no problem. There's usually
somewhere you can store things that's cool - make a root cellar?

we don't have that kind of situation so
it would be for long term storage of eating.
it also helps if the seeds are good to eat
too.

Yes. Those are, BTW edible and quite meaty in the Dill's Atlantic
Giant pumpkin, even if the pumpkins are not. The potimarron makes for
small seeds, not so good for roasting.

I have a squash type that Jerre Gettle (of Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds)
recommended to me for use as a seed squash - "Lady Godiva". The seeds
are virtually devoid of shell (it's more like the film you find on
dried squash seeds), so are edible without shelling.

roasting (but i do like the carmelization that
happens with roasted squash a lot).

Indeed, this is a huge plus with the flavours - the squash becomes
sweeter.

we need about two to three dozen storable squash or
pumpkins per season. though at first when they come
in storage isn't as big a requirement (we'll eat them ).

I had a very prolific Delicato squash a couple seasons ago (it's in
the background of the above images - the vines are to the right of the
folded-over kiddie gate (used as a short trellis for something else),
and extend clear over to the handful of corn plants* - it was over 12
feet across. One day, it started withering up, and I found that a
gopher had decimated the roots. That was drip irrigated in a well as
described above, and although there were MANY developing squash on it
that were aborted because the plant dies, we still managed to harvest,
as I recall, _32) squashes in the 1.5 - 2 lb size from the thing.
Those, like butternut, store extremely well.


*birds decimated my germinating corn earlier that year - I've since
gone to germinating in a screen-covered planter and xplant the corn
after it's a bit more hardy - 3-4" tall shoots.