[DenisCooper]

So I know I planted some pumpkins but also bought some random squash plants from a sale. I’ve just come to check on them amongst all the weeds (it’s been a bit neglected this year) so I’m not sure if these are pumpkins or something else. They are showing no signs of being orange.

[macgro7]

There are hundreds of varieties of pumpkins - orange, yellow, white, blue, of all sizes and shapes.
Pumpkins are usually orange inside other squash can be yellow, green etc. Even that is not always true 

Whatever they are you can eat them!

I pick up your fruit as summer squash - both courgettes, and pumpkins.
If you let them mature (white for the leaves to start dying off) then you can store the fruits for months and months (some of mine last till April!). Courgettes will then become marrows.

My favourite winter squash are Uchiki Kuri and Blue Hubbard- by far the best flavour. And I tried many

[DenisCooper]

Great thanks. I’ll wait for the leaves to die back before harvesting them then!

[Fleecewife]

My favourite winter squash are Uchiki Kuri and Blue Hubbard- by far the best flavour. And I tried many

The first time I grew Uchiki Kuri was by mistake on the manure heap at my first allotment - what a magnificent crop and I've grown them ever since 


I'm never totally sure of the difference between squash and pumpkins.  Roughly I had thought the ones you use fresh from the plant in summer were squash and the winter storers and carvers were pumpkins.  But then Butternuts are called squash but store for ages 

[macgro7]

Yes, there's some confusion to which is which.
They are all squash really.

Traditionally pumpkins are all the round orange varieties.
HOWEVER they actually belong to 2 separate species - both species have many varieties of both summer and winter squash.
Some orange round pumpkins belong to 1 species and some to the other.
And to make it worse they cross pollinate - if you grown them at the allotment, or anywhere less than 100 metres or so, from another variety, the seeds next year might not grow into the same fruit.

Same with cucumbers, gourds and melons.

I really want to try growing "Armenian cucumber" next year, also known as yard long cucumber.
They grow 2-3 feet long, look and taste like cucumbers with light green skin (same colour as cucumber inside), but they are actually a variety of the same species of plant which produces cateloupe melon!

[arobwk]

Being a TAS member is priceless !  Thanks for that [member=156019]macgro7[/member]

[macgro7]

In Australia and New Zealand they usually call blue varieties pumpkins.

Those type of squashes came from the Americas. Before Columbus in Europe, Middle East etc they used to have only gourds and cucumbers.
Gourds used to be called pumpkins too - just to make it even more confusing 

[Fleecewife]

Well no wonder I'm confused and now it's even worse