Anybody here with experience growing bottle gourds?

[kayjay]

Dave, I'm glad you started this thread. I only read it today, because when I hear (read) the word 'gourd', I assume something inedible. I'd love to grow a vining zucchini sub. Zucchini close to the ground ends up getting too much shade in my yard.

I'm one of those sad gluten-free people and spiralized zucchini is my favorite noodle sub. I bought an electric spiralizer, but it's a total dud. I went back to the hand-held one I used before. My go-to is just to sautee it in some butter and/or olive oil plus herbs. It works nicely with just about any sauce, too.

I wonder how the bottle gourds would do in a zucchini lasagna.

Anyway, thanks for the inspiration. This is on my to-try list for next summer.

[pepperhead212]

Glad I could help, Kayjay. Though these things are grown more in the tropics, the cool weather I had early on, that stunted my peppers and eggplants, didn't seem to hold these back at all! So they should do well for you in your area. And another thing I've noticed is that they store fairly well, as I have a couple on my counter for a couple weeks! Must be sort of like waxy melons, though not as obvious as those.

Here's one of the newest ones:
DSCF0880 by pepperhead212, on Flickr

[pepperhead212]

Here is a photo with one of the two short variety that I harvested today, just 5 days after the severe pruning. In between that one, and a bitter melon I also harvested today, is one I removed during the pruning, as it had simply stopped growing. You can see the difference that pruning made!
DSCF0883 by pepperhead212, on Flickr

[applestar]

That’s fantastic. I see that partially grown, stuck in development fruits on cucumbers sometimes. I wonder if similar pruning treatment would help? I will have to remember this.

[pepperhead212]

I hadn't thought of that, apple, but I know what you mean about the cukes. I have also had some like that in the past. I have one plant this year that has an incredible number of side shoots, and I'll have to keep an eye on those, for this same problem.

[imafan26]

Usually when I see gourds that are fat on the stem end and skinny on the blossom end, it was because it was raining when the flowers were out and there was uneven pollination. Gourds do keep a while after picking but we usually use them within a week. We may share a larger one since they don't keep well after it has been cut.

I don't know how well they do as noodles but older ones that are a little too tough to eat can be sliced into strips and dried to make kampyo.

[pepperhead212]

These things must have been grown on steroids! Here is the latest harvest (along with some other things!), and I trimmed a bunch more dying leaves today, so that should trigger them again. Incredible production.
DSCF0891 by pepperhead212, on Flickr

[pepperhead212]

Some of these finally started developing seeds, and a spongy center, like zucchini - the long variety, at about 36 oz ( I had some get to 46 oz before, with no signs of it). So I'll have to watch them closely, and remove them before they get too large from now on. The small ones were still ok to use on the spiralizer. And I froze about a cup of the noodles, to see how it would hold up to freezing.

[imafan26]

It is easy to get 20 or more gourds from a healthy vine. Usually, we let some of the last ones go to seed, so we can plant them again. The seeds keep pretty well for at least a couple of years. I'd be interested to hear how they fare. I have never tried to freeze them.

[pepperhead212]

I left one of those bottle gourds on the plant for too long (got distracted from the garden, working on that tub project) - it got to 71 oz., and I'm sure it got spongy and seedy inside, like zuke does when it gets overgrown. But I'm going to scrape it out, when I cut it open, and try to make some pickles, using a recipe for zucchini pickle spears. I'll let you know how it turns out.
It doesn't really look that much larger than the 32 oz one, sitting right next to it:
DSCF0914 by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Later, I'll have to go out and trim a lot of those old leaves, and trigger the flowering again, as it seems to have slowed down again.

Today I went into a new Indian grocery store, that a store owner I used to deliver to told me about. They had these, both the long and the shorter one, and had them labeled "light squash", I guess referring to the color. I didn't ask yet, but maybe this is a place I can barter some of these things at.

[kayjay]

I ordered my seeds. I was doing some reading, and I didn't realize that these are Opo squash! They sell them at all the grocery stores around here. I've tried them before and I know I liked it. I love living in an ethnically-diverse city.

Dave (or others) can I bug you with a couple of questions?

1. Do you remember what your seeds looked like? I believe they're supposed to look brown, shriveled-up, and almost rectangular. But one of the other customers on amazon said the seeds looked like pumpkin seeds. There was no follow-up from that customer. All of the other reviews were positive. I'll be interested to see what these ones look like.

2. Did you ever cook up your frozen noodles? How were they?

TIA.