Squashes growing too fast?

Green Magpie

Last year I grew some nice little winter squashes, a variety called Little Honey Bear. I cut them in September,as recommended, and they were delicious.  This year I put in the rest of the seeds and now have four big, vigorous plants with squashes on them.

The thing is, some of the fruits are already bigger than the optimum (cricket-ball) size, and swelling daily. I water them, but not excessively. They just love this heat. So do I pick them when they're big enough? Let them go on growing and risk them getting too big and watery? Stop watering? Or just pick one and try it, to see if it's good? And if it's OK, will they all be ready to pick and store once they're big enough, even though they're two months early?

Womble54

Speaking from zero experience with these, I’d always go for picking one and see how they are. If they’re good and you pick them all, you may be able to get a second crop in if this warm weather keeps up.

Womble54

Out of interest, can that variety be trained to climb? Always on the lookout for new varieties to try but have limited space.

Dovefromabove

Pick them at the optimum size or they'll stop production ... store some, blanch/cook and freeze some, turn some into chutney, eat some now and give some away/swap.  Make the most of a good year for squashes 

Green Magpie

Womble, they don't seem very interested in climbing. So far they are reasonably compact and are not even trailing much, although I think last year they did trail eventually. I think most squashes will climb a bit if you encourage them,but the fruits are pretty heavy.

Thank you, Dove, I will start harvesting and hope to store them. They are too nice for chutney (or to give away!), and I am already quite well supplied with rhubarb chutney this year.

Dovefromabove

Green Magpie said:

... Thank you, Dove, I will start harvesting and hope to store them. They are too nice for chutney (or to give away!), and I am already quite well supplied with rhubarb chutney this year.

Too nice for chutney ?!  .... does not compute   

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Green Magpie

Thank you, scroggin, I will have to mull this over. I was only planning to get three or four fruits per plant.

Dove: you can make chutney from any old rubbish and if you get the mix right it'll still taste good. I wouldn't want to waste good squashes in a chutney.

BobTheGardener

I've grown "Honey bear", an acorn type which gets to about 7 to 8" diameter.  I wonder if "Little honey bear" has been bred from that to produce more but smaller fruits and for immediate use rather than storing?  Google not coming up with anything useful on that front.   I grow all of mine (both acorn and butternut types) for winter storage/use so always let them ripen on the vine and harvest before the first frost.

Green Magpie

Aha! I have got the name wrong! I thought I had lost the packet, but I have found it and it says nothing at all about them being "Little". Where did I get that from? They are Honey Bear. 

All it says about harvesting is that they can normally be picked 100 days from planting out. I reckon it's only about 55 days, so there's some way to go! The skin of the biggest one is darkening now, so perhaps it will firm up and stop growing so fast.  It's perhaps 5 inches in diameter now, so I think I'll have to forget about cricket balls and not worry if it gets fatter.

Skandi

You cannot pick winter squash early. They also won't get watery if they get bigger. So Just watch them grow and be proud! Mine have just set their first fruit..