I was gifted a package of seed called “cooking pumpkins”. So now I am preserving a legacy of pumpkins while adding more diversity. This year I bought some packages of butternut to add to the mix.
In general they look like Cucurbita moschata to me. At least I see 4 different forms.
I also sowed some Cucurbita ficifolia and Cucurbita maxima to the mix, late in the summer, but have not yet produced and probably will not cross pollinate.
The blue one that has a small neck looks interesting.
Yes, they all look like Cucurbita moschata with that flared peduncle.
Yep, I think they are all mochatas. Seeds looks a lot like mochatas.
That’s unfortunate. I have seen blue moschatas on the usda grin website. I think they do exist.
Black futsu is dark and has a chalky skin as it ripens/cures.
Yeah, I like to check the varieties in grin websites, and there are very interesting things that are hard to get.
when I run a finger over it I can remove the stuff on the top, the same thing happens to black futsu?
First Seldon crisis have arrived to Richard foundation of seeds. I found my pumpkin seeds trays eaten by some type of animal, probably a bird. First time it is happened to me. The pepo (zuccini) seeds that were in the next tray are totally fine. I checked the pumpkin cells and most of them are empty. I sense that 80%+ of my planted seeds is lost. The seeds were totally covered by dirt and even I put another layer on top to cover more. They were 208 mochata seeds and 312 maxima seeds on the trays. 
I finished building an small greenhouse 1,5x2m / 5x6.5feet to put he seedlings inside. Maybe to rescue the remaining seeds. It appears to me that in the greenhouse the seedlings dry up faster for me, last year most of my tomatoes dried up for me inside the green house.
Here is the bird damage.
Not everything is gone, I think I still have 40% of the swaps seeds remaining unplanted, so will continue with them and see how it develops.
Here are my pepo (zucchini) seedlings that have started to sprout, probably in 2 weeks I can start sowing them.
So sorry to hear 
. We had something similar happen with squash last year. I’m our case the relevant pest seems to have been voles. Direct sowed hundreds of seeds, got probably fewer than fifty plants and fewer than ten fruit. Nearly all from a decorative mini-pepo
The seeds of Joseph Lofthouse’s moschata landrace and landrace in general must be better than other squash seeds, because the seeds of a fruit mistakenly left the compost heap one evening … the next morning the time to tilt that I had to recover them 100% had disappeared. While seeds of other classic squash remain months on the job without ever being eaten. Coincidence or more nutritious seeds for our animal friends?
Interesting. My zucchini seeds are intact, and the mochata and maxima gone. Maybe the seeds got some residual or sugary odor that atracts birds?
Oh, instead of a bird maybe it was a rat or a wild rabbit. They are frequent in the zone too.
Time to setup a camera?
Maybe so! I’ve always thought how interesting it would be to see the critters that come round here at night
Last year dad went out and planted an area of sweet corn. He went out over many days planting his rows. Later he waited for sprouts. There was very few.
Dad was at the store and the neighbor to this sweet corn area asked what dad was planting because he’d see turkey down there walking in a straight line… peck… step… peck… step… peck… 
As Stéphane mentions, I’ve had a rat or something chewing through certain pumpkins, leaving a mess of flakey bits and then eating the seeds mostly, leaving another mess of empty hulls. Some they kind of tested, i found bites out of them and then moving on to the next one, and the next one. It looks like they’re only interested in certain ones. I’ve put one pumpkin half eaten one in a trap to catch it, but didn’t catch it.
Maybe the cats had it when it went out after two weeks of pumpkin seeds…
But it never happened before i diversified like with Thomas seeds. I always wondered at the compost pile, why nothing comes and eats pumpkin seeds or pumpkins. Why do we, if wild animals don’t?
So i’d say it’s a good sign!
I changed the method and now are more protected. I got 3 trays of mochata left ones, and 3 trays of maxima right ones. They have sprout fast in the greenhouse. The snake gourd does not like being there very much, or did I do something wrong.
I have reused the potting soil, and I found that there are volunteer plants, probably sunflowers seeds that did not germinated last Autumn.
