If you are saying squash hasn't produced anything other than tiny fruit you might find my advice hard to take. It isn't unusual for it to take pollinators a while to find blossoms when they first appear. Female blossoms look like tiny fruit and if not pollenated will continue growing until vine has several the size of your pinky so vine stops producing female blossoms. It's nature at work same as if you go on vacation for 2 weeks you only have a few days in number and vines have ceased producing when you return home. Soon as you pull all over mature fruit vines go back to producing. My advice is pull everything that resembles fruit from vines (half your vines if you want to compare results) , then soon as new females appear use male blossoms to hand pollenate them. You should see nice size fruit right a way and you notice pollinators buzzing around vines early mornings. There's no guarantee pollinators will show up so you might need to continue hand pollenating. Many plants are in full bloom in Spring so it's possible pollinators are draw away from squash to more abundant or attractive plants. Then there's the neighbor who squirts broad spectrum insecticides on their yard,shrubs,fence,house and anything else that doesn't run for it's life. That's right, exterminators apply insecticides to millions of homes and yards on regularly sceduled calander at homeowners request for pests they have never seen but want to make sure never show up. I'm not totally apposed to pestacides but I be hanged if I'm spraying for something I don't even have (possible exceotion for termites in certain locations). ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,What was you question? LOL Good luck and let us know how it works out.

I'm wondering how you decided they were 'ripe'. (If they were literally ripe they'd be inedible.) You just want them ready, rather than ripe. So, I suspect you just picked them too early.

Kate, I love picking crookneck at that size, then I split them vertically and saute them cut-side down in olive oil until nicely browned. yum. And so pretty on the plate. :)

eta: first pic I found... you want it at least as browned as this:

Klem1, than you for the info on the growing. I never had to do this before, but this year has been sooooo weird with weather and such that it's hard to guess what may happen. There are only a couple of little ones on the vines, so I will give them a pull and start over.

Floral, you are correct, they are at the correct stage for eating... tho' small.

Party, yum! I didn't get to make them last night, so will try your idea today. I'm thinking that small will be better for cooking for me, rather than the bigger ones.

Kate, they look good to me, I try to pick mine small. The bigger ones are good for pickles and muffins but the small ones are the ones I roast or saute.

I have a lot of little zucchini on the vines, about the size of my thumb. I've been keeping careful watch for the past 2 days, I want them a bit bigger but not baseball bat size!

Good luck with yours, I hope your plants come around and you get all you want.

Annie