Thanks Dawn, I knew you would have some great information. I was thinking of following my onions and potatoes with some more winter squash. I think somewhere else you mentioned which types would work best for planting in hot weather like that?

A little research showed that the moschata varieties would be best?

So is it OK to put the squash in a place it might freeze in the winter? We have an unheated but insulated workshop.

If it is a very thick-skinned squash, yes. With the skin-thinned ones, no. The ones I store in the garage have very, very thick, dense, rock-hard rinds. I can miss a few while harvesting and they can endure several hard freezes in the garden and it doesn't even blemish their skin. It practically takes a machete or chain saw to cut into some of them.

Do you direct seed when following potatoes and onions with them or pre-start them and transplant?

I've done it both ways. This year I direct-seeded some C. moschata varieties of winter squash into the Three Sisters garden once the corn had sprouted because I wanted the corn to have a head start before the other two sisters started growing. Otherwise the beans and winter squash can overwhelm the young corn plants. In the front garden's Three Sisters garden I sowed seed of Musquee de Provence and Dickinsin Pumpkin, and I believe I sowed the seeds just last week. In the back garden's Three Sisters garden, I sowed the seeds of Seminole Pumpkin, using the large-fruited strain. Later on, I'll plant the Seminole Pumpkin small fruited strain in one of the current onion beds. Then I started seeds of other varieties in flats to start sprouting to give me transplants to put in the beds after the cool-season plants finish up. Those small plants in flats mostly have just the cotyledons and one true leaf so far. Today I'll carry in those flats, which currently are sitting on a table at the west end of the garden, and put them in the mudroom before the severe weather starts. The plants in these flats are going into the ground as soon as possible. I started them a little early because May weather can be awful and filled with hail. I wanted to have new plants going to plug into any openings in the garden if hail wipes out something.

I started far too many seeds of the hot season crops last week and will spend the next month trying to cram them all into the ground somewhere, but I did start seeds of a lot of relatively compact bush-type varieties that really do not require huge amounts of room.

My intermediate daylength onions already are hitting the soft neck stage, so those two raised beds, which are not very large---maybe 4' wide x 10' long max---will be opening up sometime over the next two weeks,with the short day types just behind them. It just depends on how long it takes the majority of those plants to have the necks weaken naturally and fall over. I generally go ahead and harvest the bed once about 80% to 90% of the onions in that bed hit the softneck stage. The more compact varieties of winter squash and succession crops of summer squash will go into, eventually, five small onion beds. The sixth onion bed is larger and will have a trellis set up for a succession planting of vining types of Korean summer squash and Crane melons. The potato beds, with their richer soil, are reserved for muskmelons, cantaloupes and other forms of non-watermelon type melons.

I have room in the front garden to do quite a lot of succession planting, and plenty of space remains open right now in the back garden. I try to never plant all of one type veggie in the back garden, though, because the voles can show up suddenly in the heat of the summer and start feeding on the plant roots. I try to hedge my bets by having some of the hot season plants in the back garden and some in the front.

Since Mother Nature quickly will fill any suddenly bare space with a gazillion weeds if given the chance, I try to get the succession crop in the ground the same day I clear out a bed by harvesting the earlier crop, whether I am starting from seed sown directly or from transplants.

Denise I cooked pureed and dehydrated some of mine last year. Mostly to see if i like it and to save space. Great for squash soup and a side dish. Also I made fruit roll ups using squash bananas and applesauce. I added cinnamon but not enough for my tastes. I like it little man likes pear candy better.

The fruit roll ups with squash sound really good. I've done the puree and freeze avenue, but I wanted to be able to have some fresh, maybe for stir-fries.

I planted a ridiculous amount of squash plants expecting something would begin killing them along the way, but so far nothing has. This kinda makes me laugh because, you know, with the heavy SVB pressure in this state, a person never should complain about too much squash because the abundance isn't going to last forever. However, too much squash still is too much, so even though we eat what we can and I preserve much of the rest, we have so many piling up in the kitchen that I have resorted to slicing them up to feed the chickens. They are a nice treat for chickens on a hot day. I've only seen (and killed) one squash bug, but I'm sure more will show up. I've already seen reports of SVBs in various gardens in TX, OK and AR, so I'm sure they'll be showing up in my garden any day now.

Dawn - I am trying out winter squash for really the first time this year. I tried and failed (due to SVB and squash bugs) several years ago but I have some open bed space coming up soon and want to give it another try. I have Honey Bear acorn squash and Butterscotch mini butternut from Johnny's to sow.

After you harvest in the fall do you wipe them down with diluted bleach immediately and then place them into your storage area or do they need some special curing conditions before putting them into storage?

I usually wipe them down and let them cure for 7-10 days in open, dry air in the shade if I can, and then move them to their long-term storage place. However, if I had to harvest them in icky, cold, rainy conditions, I just wipe them down and put tem into their storage spot right away. They store fine no matter which option I use.