Marrows

[debbie_7155]

Hi im new to this forum & look forward to meeting you all,
Anyway i planted some marrow seeds a few days ago, first time ive grown them, i have them in my conservatory at the minute, theyre about 1 inch tall now,
when its safe for them to go outside i don't want to plant them in the ground, i would like to try & grow them in something but not sure what & do i need to put the marrows on glass when they start growing?
any advice is appreciated
0h i live in the UK, & garden is south facing

[The Helpful Gardener]

Hi Deb,

Gave me a bad minute as I racked the old noggin; a quick web search cleared it up for me. Courgettes, or what we know in the States by it's Italian moniker, zucchini is little short of a weed here as there is a bad tendency to wait until the fruit is enormous. Bags are surreptiously left on neighbors steps to decrease the harvest; bread containing the stuff is made in vast quantity and finally as a last act of desperation, ratatouille recipes appear from the back of the recipe file to assault guests with vats of the stuff while chanting the battle cry "It's a taste of summer. Take seconds!" ...Don't become this person. Harvest while they are small and tender but still have a nice firmness the older plant overdoes on the outside and underdoes on the inside.

You have a sooth face; good light. Plant single plants a meter apart. The average household needs no more than three plants unless they are provisioning Mongol hoards (rookie mistake; they sell them in six packs so you plant them in six-packs; break out the ratatouille and Zucchini bread recipes...

http://www.beyond.fr/food/ratatouille.html

http://www.dianaskitchen.com/page/bread/zbread.htm

Just plant it. Nice soil makes for a better plant, but it doesn't matter really, you can't stop it. It's a machine; the Terminator of the vegetable garden. A nice organic mulch and let it rip. Keep the kids clear while it winds up. Pruning when they get a meter across keeps it tidy and flowering.

I'll be back...

[opabinia51]

Basically, I am in concurrence with Scotts assesment about zucchini. Though around here what we call marrow is not a summer squash but, a winter squash that is akin to a buttercup squash. They are prolific growers but, the yields are not up to par with the zucchini. Maybe a few squash per plant.

As are as when to plant your plants outside, wait until after the last frost then plant your squash ontop of mounds. Even better is to plant them with corn where the corn is on top of the mounds and the squash are in the valleys between the mounds. You'll find that everything will grow that much better and the squash will help keep the weeds down.

If you do choose to plant your squash with the corn, plant the corn seed first and wait until the corn are a few inches tall before placing the squash in the valleys.

[Grey]

Oh Squash! I had no idea what marrow was. I have friends in the UK and we often find our names for things are different. Since I do want to go to the UK someday... it's good to know these things

Squash are really, really easy to grow - I've honestly paid them no mind before and they did just fine. I haven't much to add that hasn't already been said - just a nod in agreement here!

As far as food goes... I LOVE fried squash. I've moved to the South - these people put squash in everything. It'll show up in vegetable soup; chicken noodle soup; squash casserole; squash, chicken & cracker casserole (yes, they cook with crackers too around here), it shows up just about anywhere imaginable. Then of course, me being more of the italian cook, there's all kinds of recipes there. So I disagree with Scott's assessment that you can have too much of the stuff. He can send me his extras. I won't complain.

[opabinia51]

Oh Grey, let me tell you about the first time that I grew Zucchini (aka summer squash).

So, I had done my mounds for the winter squash and thought that it would be cool to plant zucchini around the peripheries of the mounds and have summer squash all summer long as well as the winter squash in the fall and winter..... BIG MISTAKE.

HUGE MISTAKE. All summer and fall long I had zucchini coming out of my ears, I couldn't pick it fast enough and the little ones (witin a few days) would grow into huge zucchini. At one point after giving away a ton of squash, I decided to grate and freeze a bunch of it. 112 cups of grated zucchini later.... I gave half of it to a local food bank and froze the other half in the communal freezer at my Grandmother/uncles place and my grandmother (who makes soups, breads, tartes and so on from it) just finished the last bag of it this year. I still have part of a bag of the stuff in my freezer.

And the zucchini totally smothered my winter squash that year. Didn't even get one.

So, you can get to much. Crazy.

Incidentally, that year I did the yellow variety and the green and after eating zucchini every day and night all summer and fall long, I decided that I like the green better because I find the yellow to be sweeter and I'm not a fan of sweet things.

[Grey]

Oh my, Opa! That is a lot.

I've only got four zucchini started right now, as I haven't got a large space yet for my garden - I didn't grow any here last year so I don't know what to expect just yet.

[opabinia51]

Four will be more than enough. As Scott previously said: one or two is a lot. I may do one green zucchini in the garden this year. Though, I am also doing a plethora of winter squash, I'll wait and see if there is room.