Hello, all! Going to Seed would like to offer a cushaw (C. argyrosperma or mixta) seed mix in 2025 but this will depend on if we receive enough seed to distribute. If you had a successful harvest and can spare some seed, please fill out this form and mail in the seed by the end of November.
If you would like to donate seed of other crops at the same time, include them on the same form and send in one box (each crop separately packaged and labeled, of course!). Feel free to reach out if you have any questions. Thank you so much!
I will be offering some C. argyrosperma seeds grown at my farm, and some grown nearby, to Going to Seed.
Between the time I planted argyrosperma in 2023 and when I planted for 2024, I discovered that there are argyro varieties that keep much longer and have sweeter flesh than the ones Iâd been growing, which are better as summer squash. Commercial seeds sold simply as âGreen Striped Cushawâ or âWhite Cushawâ may have genetics from summer and/or winter types.
Iâve been reading a lot of cushaw seed catalog descriptions. Sometimes you will see clues that a cushaw is probably not a winter squash type like ânot a good keeperâ or âuse by Thanksgivingâ. There are some other terms that are not definitive, like âlight colored flesh/mild flesh/nutty fleshâ.
This is a more useful description in terms of keeping quality from Southern Exposure: â[Grown in s. Illinois since at least the 1830s, including by friends of Abraham Lincolnâs parents.] Long white 15-30 lb. fruits with large curved necks and some green mottled striping. Light yellow flesh has mild, pleasant flavor. Earlier and better keeping than Green-Striped Cushaw.â
Iâve been reading that there are varieties which are mainly valued for their seeds. Campeche is one. âThick Margin Silver Seedâ and âSilver Seedâ are two offered by Sandhill Preservation Center in the seed type.
I wonder if anyone else growing C. argyrosperma cushaw and thinking of contributing cushaw seeds this year has any thoughts on the different uses of different varieties. The two fruits I had from the best winter squash type of 2023 was still in good condition when I opened them up in April 2024.
I have a wishlist-in-progress of cushaw seeds from catalogs that I have flagged as potentially having good winter squash characteristics. Why not share the list here in the forum?
Sandhill Preservation Center
Possibly the greatest variety of cushaws offered by a single vendor. Some of the most interesting are:
WIP: Generalized cushaw gardening calendar for Kentucky
Note: Kentucky is in a temperate climate within USDA zones 6 and 7.
This schedule is still in development. I hope to continue improving it with input from other growers. This may include reworking it so it is less focused on Kentucky and more easily adapted to other climates.
April
As needed: prepare and cultivate beds for the cushaw plants
Week 3 or 4
If using starts, begin sowing seeds for starts
May
As needed: prepare and cultivate beds for the cushaw plants
Continue sowing seeds for starts
Week 2 or 3
If direct sowing, begin direct sowing
Week 4
If using starts, begin transplanting starts into beds once they have two or more true leaves
I donât have anything fancy for cushaws, just the Orange Striped Cushaw that @DebbieA sent last year and I wasnât able to get planted, plus a green-striped cushaw and a variety given to me labelled Tennessee Sweet Potato. I used to grow it out, and it was a long-keeping winter type cushaw, nothing spectacular for flavor but neglect-friendly, relatively productive, and very hearty. And the dang thing would climb up into a tree given a chance. Those will be getting free range in the bare space left by contractors taking out some of my sandplum thicket⌠as thick as theyâll grow and spread, I figure theyâll be a great groundcover until I finalize plans for the space!
I have been called away from the garden frequently this spring for flood recovery and other pressing responsibilities in our small mountain valley. In 2024 I really enjoyed writing periodic emails about growing C. ficifolia, and I planned to write a series of emails about cushaw squash this year.
My hope was to be able to draw on three populations of cushaws for eating and seed sharing. As always there have been some complications, and some moments to admire how amazing these plants are. I still hope for a cushaw squash harvest
My garden
I committed to only plant cushaw seeds from Kris Hubbardâs seed conservation project. This was a mix of very old cushaw seeds from more than one old time Cherokee homestead. I had less than 10% germination rate resulting in three seedlings. I germinated and planted them at different times, but all three were destroyed by pests within a day or two of being planted in the garden. This week I have put out a few of the elite âhardshellâ cushaw seeds here in the hopes there is still time for a harvest.
Southern KY Garden
My relatives in Southern Kentucky have about a dozen âhardshellâ cushaw plants direct sown at the fringe of their lawn area. I am hoping these will produce seeds to share. The soil chemistry and rainfall is pretty different, but itâs also in the middle of traditional cushaw growing country. I think theyâre probably getting neglected in a good way. Fingers crossed.
Renew Appalachia garden
Last year, the garden at the former coal mine in Martin County Kentucky grew a lot of the high quality hardshell cushaw seeds that weâve been sharing for the 2025 season. Due to a combination of factors, they only have one or two cushaw vines planted in the spring. We direct sowed a promising bed about two weeks ago in the hopes of some more seed production this year.
Between pests taking out most of the early seedlings, and something killing the only other survivor, Iâm left with ONE cushaw vine this year. Fortunately, itâs not a total wasteâŚ
Beautiful! I havenât had any bicolor cushaws show up in my garden yet. It sounds like we both had seasons with dramatic natural selection among the cushaws.
I would really like to get some more survivors next year, but first Iâll have to figure out which critter it was that ate all the seedlings. I never caught anything in the act.
These photos are of the same vine, growing in the Southern Kentucky garden. I use the term garden loosely.
This is a typical Kentucky cushaw planting in that the âbedâ is an area that isnât useful for most types of vegetable.
Here the gardeners placed a shallow hook on their tractor and made a trough 2-3 inches wide and 1-2 inches deep. This trough loosely followed the property boundary down one side of suburban lawn, down along the back where there is a small wooded area along the creek.
Into this trough was direct seeded sunflowers and saved winter squash seeds. I didnât think to document it more comprehensibly but I expect to be there again in about a month. There were some other vines starting to sprawl, but none as far yet as this cushaw.
The deer and rabbits and turkeys and the bear have left this alone, but then it splits open. Dang it.
The 2025 mix includes some seeds from cushaws that recovered from splits this significant. This vine is probably not grown from those seeds but I can hope that it also has that ability.
I spoke with the grower of this cushaw. The key points of the conversation echoed many other conversations Iâve had with people growing cushaws the traditional way in Eastern Kentucky. The conversations like this are what has motivated me to prioritize gathering cushaw seeds in my region.
My source for this fruit is an elderly gentleman I would guess in his 70s or 80s. He says:
He would call this type a âgreen stripey cushawâ. In his experience other cushaw types are also named after the way they look, often by their color. Heâs encountered white cushaws, yellow, and orange. To be more specific about a type people might say something like a yellow stripey cushaw that stores a long time.
He recalls the old sweet hardshell type as being excellent, and has some stories about it (including how hard it is to process, stories about difficulty opening the shell often come up). He doesnât have any seeds for hardshell types, or know anywhere to get them. He would be interested in having some of those seeds if they become available.
He doesnât eat cushaws, he grows them for decoration and he says generally other people donât eat them much any more. He says that cushaws are a crop that the old people ate when he was young, and that native people ate.
We discussed genetic management of the hardshell type. He like other people has told me that sometimes the hardshell would grow with a softer skin which people treated as a dead end - they would try to go back to a source of hard skin that was known to be running true to type.
I really like the size and shape of this one. When a line of cushaws hasnât been selected for culinary quality in potentially many generations I have sometimes found great food and sometimes very poor. Iâm very curious about this one but it may be a while before I get a chance to process it.
My region started this season very wet and then, along with much of the rest of Kentucky, we entered a drought during the summer. This cushaw split open near the end of the wet months, then continued to heal and grow over the dry summer.
I wish I would have more seeds overall to offer to the exchange for next year but the ones I do contribute will have survived a tough season. I will also check the flavor and consistency of this one before sharing seeds.
Interesting. That one bi-color squash I grew also split and then healed over this summer. Since it survived all the abuse, Iâm going to be saving seed, hopefully itâll have good flavor.
These are children of the hardshell winter squash cushaws that have been grown in my region for a long time and that I often get excited about.
I think this may be a cross. I have never seen the yellow or orange stripe leaves on this variety, and I have never seen this variety start to turn orange still on the vine.
What is interesting to me is that true/inbred seeds from the previous yearâs hardshells was the only C. argyrosperma I grew in 2024 and all fruit was true to type. I did grow every other species as well including wild and 50% wild C. pepo.
My thoughts are that this could be a response to stress. It has been a very stressful growing season. This could be a rare and recessive generic combination possible with inbred genes that was already present in the original seeds and I havenât encountered it yet.
One of yearâs hardshells may have crossed with another species (C. moschata) or maybe a bee carried pulling a very long way from someone elseâs cushaws. I hope there is enough time to mature fruit from these plants or it may remain a mystery.
I also could have gotten my seeds mixed up. I wouldnât think so in this case but it would be absurd to say thatâs not a possibility too.
Edit: after reviewing last yearâs photos I have changed my theory or I at least have a theory about the mother plant. Maybe this one self-pollinated and became even more orange in the leaves and fruit.
