Cucurbita moschata
Butternut
Common names: Butternut squash, Pear squash
At a glance
- Light
- Full sun
- Spacing
- 100 cm, rows 150 cm
- Lifespan
- Annual
- Sowing
- Apr–May
- Harvest
- Sep–Oct
- Hardiness
- Cold damage below 3 °C
- Water need
- High
Photo: George Chernilevsky · Public Domain · Source
This description was machine-translated.
Description
The Butternut bears pear‑shaped fruits with creamy, almost fiber‑free flesh and a fine, slightly sweet flavor, ideal for soups, purees, and baking. Its small seed cavity means a lot of usable flesh, and when fully mature it can be stored until spring.
Care instructions
Start indoors in April, as this heat‑loving variety needs a head start. Transplant after the last frost (mid‑May, week 20) to the warmest, sunniest spot in the garden. Water generously at the roots and provide mature composted soil. Harvest late, when the skin is beige and hard and the stem has browned, then allow the pumpkins to finish ripening off the vine.
The care notes were machine-translated from German.
Garden year
SowingApr–May
HarvestSep–Oct
Germination
- Soil temperature
- from 13 °C, ideally 25 °C
- Days to sprout
- 5 to 10 days
- Light
- Sprouts in light or dark
- Sowing depth
- 2 cm
- How to start
- Start indoors, then plant out
Soil & site
Soil pH
Soil type
loamy, humus-rich, well-drained, nutrient-rich
Butternut squash wants a warm, full-sun spot with deep, humus-rich, well-drained soil; it does not tolerate waterlogging at all. Loosen heavier loam deeply before planting and work in mature compost; the pH should be between 6.0 and 7.0.
Cucurbits (cucumber, squash, courgette) are heavy feeders. Give them plenty of compost and a break of about 4 years on the same bed.
Feeding
Heavy feeder
Months
Apr–Aug
In spring, before planting out, work in mature compost and horn shavings shallowly. This carries the plant through the season as a basic supply. Once the young plants have taken and are flowering (from about June), water regularly with diluted nettle or comfrey feed to meet the high nitrogen and potassium demand during flowering and fruit set. From August, cut back on nitrogen so that the fruits ripen instead of producing new foliage. As a heavy feeder, butternut also feels right at home directly on the compost heap.
Overwintering
Butternut is annual: the plant dies with the first frost and cannot be overwintered. Harvest the fruits before the first night frosts, with a dry, corky stalk, and store them cool, frost-free and dry at around 10 to 15 °C; in spring, from April, pre-germinate indoors and plant out only after the Ice Saints.
Propagation
Methods
- From seed
In the home garden, butternut squash is propagated exclusively by sowing. Start the seeds indoors on a windowsill from mid-April: push one seed about 2 to 3 cm deep into each pot of seed compost and keep the substrate evenly warm and moist. The seedlings germinate after about 7 to 14 days. Do not plant out too early. Seedlings that stay in the pot too long become leggy and weak. Only after the Ice Saints (mid-May), when night frosts no longer threaten, do they go outdoors to a full-sun, wind-sheltered spot. Squash is frost-tender and needs warmed-through soil.
If you want to collect your own seed, leave the finest, fully ripe fruit on the plant as long as possible and harvest it late in autumn. Scrape out the seeds, rinse the flesh off thoroughly under running water, dry the seeds for one to two weeks in a warm, airy place (they snap when bent once completely dry) and store them cool, dark and dry. They then stay viable for several years. The germination rate does drop noticeably over time, though, and the safest choice is fresh seed from the last two to three years.
On varietal purity: most butternut varieties (e.g. ‘Waltham’) are open-pollinated, so seed you collect yourself comes true, provided no cross-pollination has happened. The most important crossing partner is another Cucurbita moschata variety in the same garden; these cross reliably with one another. Crosses with C. pepo (courgette, many ornamental squashes) or C. maxima (Hokkaido) are rare in practice, but not entirely ruled out; so do not rely blindly on the species boundary. If you have only one moschata variety and distance from others, you need do nothing further. If several varieties are in flower at the same time, pollinate by hand: the evening before, loosely close one still-closed female and one male flower of the same variety (e.g. with tape), open them briefly the next morning, transfer the pollen with a soft brush or directly, and then close the female flower again until it has faded.
Companion planting
Good neighbors
legume family (Fabaceae)
Beans and peas enrich the soil with nitrogen, which cucurbits, as heavy feeders, can make good use of.
For example PeaBush beanPole beanBroad beanSnow peaWrinkled pea and 36 more species in the catalogue
Source: classic companion planting (DACH-Gartenpraxis)
Rather not
nightshade family (Solanaceae)
You should avoid planting potato and cucumber together because they share disease pathogens such as leaf and brown rot and stand in each other's way as strong feeders.
For example TomatoSweet pepperCocktail tomatoEggplantCape gooseberryChili and 13 more species in the catalogue
Source: basic crop-rotation rule
Companion planting is partly traditional gardening lore. Where the reason is known, it is given.
Some of these explanations were machine-translated.
For your garden
Grow Butternut yourself
Gartenkern tells you when frost is coming, when to sow and when to harvest, for your location.
Free, no time limit
Notes from real gardens
What other gardeners have written down about this variety, anonymous and voluntary.
No notes shared yet. Will you be the first to write one down?