{"id":6012,"date":"2013-03-25T03:09:48","date_gmt":"2013-03-25T10:09:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/?p=6012"},"modified":"2013-03-23T03:53:46","modified_gmt":"2013-03-23T10:53:46","slug":"growing-butternut-squash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/flowers\/vegetables-herbs\/growing-butternut-squash\/","title":{"rendered":"Growing Butternut Squash"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a title=\"Butternut Squash by brianpettinger, on Flickr\" href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/hortoris\/4340577124\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/farm5.static.flickr.com\/4013\/4340577124_dac60dc676.jpg\" alt=\"Butternut Squash\" width=\"448\" height=\"336\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Butternut squash<\/strong> are delicious, prolific and easy to grow. They like to ramble and scramble, pinch out when the lead shoot is 3 feet long to encourage fruiting. Each plant can produce 4-8 fruit each weighing over 2 pounds. Butternut Squash has a sweet, nutty taste that is similar to pumpkin. It has yellow skin and orange fleshy pulp. When ripe, it turns increasingly deep orange, and becomes sweeter and richer.<br \/>\nI am going to try again this year as I have never been successful with this crop. I will content my self with 2-3 fruit per plant and will pollinate by hand.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Grow from seed when the risk of frost has gone and plant out 3 foot apart.<\/li>\n<li>During the growing season it is vital to ensure that the plant never dries out to stop fruit being shed.<\/li>\n<li>Deep beds with a mulch of rotted horse manure and a weekly feed  with Miracle-gro or Phostrogen will help crop size.<\/li>\n<li>Keep stalks\/stems dry to avoid rotting.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>Harvesting and Storing<\/h2>\n<p>When the fruit is ripe  the texture of the skin  becomes  firm, golden in colour and will easily resist the pressure of your thumb nail. Like a melon, it &#8220;rings&#8221; when given a good rap.<br \/>\nStorage as for all vegetables of this type is in a clean, cool, dry place. I have seen them stored in a loft space on top of fiber glass insulation.<br \/>\nIf picked in late September they can last until April the following year.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">Winter Barbara Butternut F1\u00c2\u00a0 Seeds <a href=\"http:\/\/www.awin1.com\/cread.php?awinmid=2283&amp;awinaffid=81944&amp;clickref=&amp;p=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.thompson-morgan.com\/seeds1\/product\/778\/1.html \"> by Thompson Morgan<\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">Waltham  Dutchy Originals\u00c2\u00a0 Seeds <a href=\"http:\/\/www.awin1.com\/cread.php?awinmid=2283&amp;awinaffid=81944&amp;clickref=&amp;p=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.thompson-morgan.com\/seeds1\/product\/gwd4732\/1.html \"> by Thompson Morgan<\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><strong>More Cultivation Instructions<\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Sow seeds mid April to June, 25mm deep in pots or trays of moist seed compost and germinate at 20C for up to 7 days. Sow seeds on edge for reliable germination. Alternatively sow outdoors in rich soil in full sun from mid May through June, 25mm deep at 120cm spacing.<\/p>\n<p>Pot on individual seedlings in to small pots of compost, keep barely moist to prevent stems from rotting and protect from strong sunlight with a sheet of newspaper. Plant out at 120cm between plants each way once frost risk has passed, then water and mulch regularly.<\/p>\n<p>Harvest small as baby butternuts and steam or bake whole, or stuff when picked at full size.<\/p>\n<p>Harvest fruits regularly for heaviest crops and to extend the season. Harvest all fruits before heavy frost. Can be stored indoors at 10C for several months.<br \/>\nRead more <a href=\"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/flowers\/vegetables-herbs\/growing-pumpkins-and-squash\/\">about growing squash<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Butternut squash are delicious, prolific and easy to grow. They like to ramble and scramble, pinch out when the lead shoot is 3 feet long to encourage fruiting. Each plant can produce 4-8 fruit each weighing over 2 pounds. Butternut Squash has a sweet, nutty taste that is similar to pumpkin. It has yellow skin and orange fleshy pulp. When ripe, it turns increasingly deep orange, and becomes sweeter and richer. I am going to try again this year as&#8230;<\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more\"><a class=\"btn btn-default\" href=\"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/flowers\/vegetables-herbs\/growing-butternut-squash\/\"> Read More<span class=\"screen-reader-text\">  Read More<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,233],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6012","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-vegetables-herbs","category-growing-easy-plants"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6012","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6012"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6012\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6012"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6012"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6012"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}