Open bush habit allows an easier harvest of this traditional dark green zucchini. Mellow flavor. The blossoms can be batter fried.
An old timer that is the best flavored of the straight necks. It was my father's favorite. Very productive.
Can be used as summer type squash if picked when green OR as winter squash if allowed to mature on the vine to creamy beige and hard skin. Its curled form can make it difficult to handle in the kitchen, so trellising (try growing on a bamboo teepee or cattle panel archway) is a must. When the vines climb up, gravity makes the squash hang down and grow straight. These straight necks can be 2 feet long and have no seeds (seeds are in the bulbous end at the bottom), so they make great eating no matter how large the squash. You can't mess these up the way you can with zucchini, which must be picked while small so that the seeds aren't tough. Great plant for a beginning gardener because it requires little care aside from tying up the vines as they grow. Also, it is open pollinated, so you can save the seeds to share and grow next year. Holds up well against squash bugs and seems resistant to squash vine borers. Early in the season I sometimes spray with Bt, which is a natural caterpillar/bug control.
The first time I came across this squash was in the fall of 2014, and it is one of the best tasting winter squashes. Saved seeds and will try to grow some this spring.
I would love to grow pumpkins... this Sugar Pie looks so healthy!
This is probably the oldest summer squash still grown. Usually just called White Patty Pan, White Scallop, or Ten Toes, it and Wood's Prolific are the only two white scallops that I know about. It is more bland than yellow squash, but good in its class. Productive.
Probably the best of the cushaws, and certainly the most popular. In the south it is more reliable than C. pepo or C. maxima pumpkins. I have grown the Jonathon, Gold Striped, and Tennesee Sweet Potato. Green Striped produced when the others failed.
The summer crookneck is a real antique. It was grown by native tribes before Jamestown. It vies with the White Bush Scallop for antiquity. Both were used as immature fruits as food and mature fruits were dried and used as rattles. It is heavily warted, but one of the best flavored crooknecks I have eaten. Modern derivatives are smooth, but some of the flavor seems to have gone with the warts.
These make great decorations and are also edible! Just cut off the top like you would a big pumpkin, use a melon baller to remove the seeds and stringy pulp, add some butter and seasonings of your choice to the inside -- or stuff with whatever you like, as you would an acorn squash -- and then bake for 30-45 minutes, until tender.
I got these seeds from the Whitinger Seed company last year after hearing from @dave and @trish that they were hands down the best for dessert. I would definitely agree!
