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What is hidden in a bag of decorative pumpkin seeds

Decorative pumpkins, small-fruited mixture Buying seeds of decorative pumpkins, many do not even imagine what variety is covered under the name “Decorative pumpkin. Mixture". By planting these spectacular, fast-growing vines, you will have a whole botanical community of all kinds and forms belonging to the Pumpkin family. Let's try to understand this issue in more detail.

The most common pumpkin seeds on sale are common curly, or small-fruited(Cucurbita pepo var. ovifera), unusually varied in shape of the fruit. The following varieties are available:

Mandarin is a rounded orange ball-shaped pumpkin with a smooth skin. For example, the variety "Little Orange" ("Kleine Orange") with bright orange fruits up to 8-10 cm in diameter.

Warty - similar to her, but not with a smooth, but with a rough, tuberous surface. Variety "Little warty" ("Kleine Warzen") has fruits 10-15 cm in diameter.

Pear-shaped - with smooth pear-shaped fruits 10-12 cm long. Fruits are yellow, orange, but the most spectacular are two-colored, as, for example, in the variety "Little two-color pear" ("Klein Birne Bicolor"), which has a clearly defined green part of the fruit, or the variety "Small two-color" ("Kleine Bicolor" ), where the underside of the fruit is green with white stripes.

Pumpkin Small OrangePumpkin Little Warty
Pumpkin Small Two Tone PearPumpkin Small Two-color

Star-shaped - resembles starfish or squash with thorns. Also known as crown pumpkin. Pumpkins of the "Ten Commendments" variety have a diameter of 10-15 cm and really deserve admiration for the huge variety of all kinds of combinations of orange, yellow, green and white in color.

The variety "Baby Boo" is distinguished by small (8-10 cm) ribbed smooth white fruits of a squat-spherical shape, as if made of paraffin.

Pumpkin Ten CommendmentsBaby Boo Pumpkin
More rare are two more types - vicoliate pumpkin(Cucurbita vicifolia syn. Cucurbita melanosperma) and pumpkin texas(WITHucurbita texana).

Vicolor pumpkin, also called Malabar pumpkin, is one of the most decorative types. Differs in beautiful lobed leaves and variegated fruits - rounded or slightly oblong, green with white stripes or specks. It is widely used in hybridization with other species.

The Texas pumpkin as a whole is very similar to the curly pumpkin (Cucurbita pepo var. ovifera)... On very long stems, pear-shaped or egg-shaped fruits are tied. So far, it is an independent species, but there is an assumption that these are the second feral curly pumpkins of Mexican origin, which are now more often classified as Cucurbita pepovar.texana.

All these pumpkins are exclusively for decorative purposes, they are not edible, but they are an excellent material for children's crafts, you can cut lanterns from them, make candlesticks, do artistic painting and burning on a pumpkin. They will complement still lifes and floristic compositions, serve as a decorative element in kitchen design.

The fruits are removed in a state of full maturity, with a hardened skin, cut off with a stalk, and dried. Unripe pumpkins with a part of the tops are hung for ripening in a dry, ventilated room.

There are other types of small pumpkin that are not only decorative, but also edible.

Turban large-fruited pumpkin Turban

Turban pumpkin(Cucurbita maxima var. turbaniformis) evokes different associations in people. As the name suggests, it reminds someone a turban, someone a mushroom, but in the Catholic world it acquired the name "bishop's miter". This is a variety of large-fruited pumpkin (Cucurbita maxima). It happens both with small, no more than 15 cm, fruits, and with larger ones. For example, the variety "Large-fruited turban" ("Grossfruechtige Turbane") grows up to 30-50 cm in diameter, has a smooth surface, a bright orange-red cap, and below - a white-green marble color. All fruits are individual, on one plant you will not find even a pair of specimens that are identical in shape and color. Despite its size, it belongs to the group of small-fruited red pumpkins, which are usually bitter and not eaten.However, in this and some other varieties, the pulp is sweet, with a light nutty aroma, and the taste is superior to that of vegetable hardy pumpkin and large-fruited pumpkin. Other varieties of turban pumpkin - small-calf and large-calf - also have a sweet yellow-orange pulp and high taste.

The fruits of one of the most decorative varieties of hard-bore pumpkin - squash kruknek are distinguished by a very unusual shape., also called crank (Cucurbita pepo var.giraumonas). Sometimes these are real twins of ordinary zucchini both in shape and in taste. And sometimes - bizarre vessels with a swan neck, like the "Cou-Tors Hative" variety. The peel is rough, bubbly, bright golden orange. The length of the fruits is up to 20 cm. For eating, young fruits, 10-15 cm long, are used, which are cooked like zucchini.

Zucchini kruknek Cou-Tors HativeLagenaria Pumpkin-vessels
Another pumpkin plant, lagenaria ordinary, can also be classified as decorative. (Lagenaria siceraria), also called bottle pumpkin. Its fruits can be of an even green color or have a marbled green-white pattern, and the shape ranges from the classic shape of a pot-bellied vessel with a neck 20 cm high, like in the Pumpkin-Vessels mixture, to a straight or curved club.

For thousands of years, this ancient pumpkin culture has been used to make various containers. Zelentsy with delicate skin is used all over the world in cooking, like cucumbers and zucchini, with which lagenaria is similar in taste, for which it is often called Vietnamese zucchini or Indian cucumber.

Decorative pumpkins in A. Tolokonnikov's garden (Novocherkassk)

All of these pumpkin seeds are suitable for quick vertical gardening. These are antennae herbaceous vines, rising along the support to a height of 4-6 m, and lagenaria - even higher, up to 10-15 m. For her and the heaviest turbid pumpkins, the support should be powerful, and the whips should also be reliably tied. As ground cover plants, pumpkin plants look good on slopes, in ornamental gardens, suitable for land surveying, for decorating compost heaps and outbuildings.

To get a good harvest, timely early planting (preferably through seedlings), humus fertile soil, sufficient heat, moisture and sun, and timely pinching of the shoots are important.

Green trellises from a variety of pumpkins look very fun and elegant. The only thing that needs to be taken into account is that the varieties are well pollinated among themselves and pumpkins grown from their own seeds next year do not always repeat the external data of the selected fruits. But something new may appear ...

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