Field Pumpkin: Cucurbita pepo

About the pumpkin

For centuries, people have utilized the pumpkin and its relatives. The pumpkin is native originally to the new world, and even before Europeans came the Americas, Native Americans were using them as an important food source. The thick skin of the pumpkin could be peeled, pressed and made into mats. Strips of flesh could be roasted on the fire and eaten. The seeds could also be cooked and ingested.

When Europeans finally arrived they saw how the native groups were using the pumpkin and quickly began using it as well. The early colonists also brought with them other traditions that took the use of the pumpkin to a whole new level. Most importantly was the use of them as Jack O’ Lanterns.

Jack O’Lanterns

The tradition of using pumpkins as Jack O’Lanterns came from an old Irish story of stingy Jack. The story gets long and complicated, but the jist of it is that stingy jack had tricked the devil multiple times whereby the devil agreed not to take his soul. So, when Jack ended up dying, the devil was true to his word. But, God decided he shouldn’t be in heaven so his soul remained on the earth. He was given only a hot coal to light his way, which he put into a small carved out turnip or gourd. He was remembered every year when people would carve out members of the cucurbitaceae family (cucurbits) and put them on the doorsteps or window ledges.

When the Europeans discovered the American pumpkins, they quickly adapted their tradition with the much larger and easily carved American gourd. It also became associated with the festival of Halloween. But Halloween wasn’t always celebrated in the same way.

Halloween

The traditions associated with Halloween have their roots in the Irish holiday Saween. Saween isn’t associated with a celebration of the devil or a lord of the dead as some people might think. In fact, it has no religious backing what-so-ever. It was celebrated from the night of October 31st to the evening of November 1st. It has the most relation to our modern New Years day. It was a celebration of the year and of the harvest. In the ancient traditions, carved gourds where put outside the house with coals in them to welcome back dead relatives and warn off Stingy Jack.

“Pumpkin” is just a name for an Orange Squash:

The name, pumpkin is an interesting way of classifying an organism. That’s because it is not only used to describe more than one species, but its often a term used to describe the morphological traits of those as well. Let me explain.

It’s common for more than one species to be described with the same common name. For instance, the colloquial term banana is used for more than one species found throughout the tropics. Most Americans see only one of these species, but in reality there are many more. What we call pumpkins are phenotypically orange individuals from the following four species C. pepo, C. maxima, C. mixta, and C. moschata.

The most difficult concept to grasp however, is that each of these species has also been domestically bred into different forms, to the point that we wouldn’t even call them pumpkins. Zucchinis for instance, are the same species as the common pumpkin, C. pepo. We wouldn’t mistakenly call a Zucchini a pumpkin would we? Thus, pumpkin is really a term used to describe a characteristically orange squash-like gourd.

What about Giant Pumpkins.

Giant pumpkins aren’t the same species as the common pumpkin you find every year for sale at Halloween. The species is C. maxima and the largest ones are also specially ‘helped’ along. The kind of giant pumpkins that win competitions take special care. First, it is important that the prize pumpkin is getting its supply of nutrients without having to compete with others on the same plant. Thus, once a pumpkin starts, the other flowers are pruned off. But, the pumpkin craze doesn’t stop there.

Special fertilizers are added to the soil and lotions are even rubbed on the outside of the pumpkin. The trick though is to make sure the pumpkins grow fast- but not too fast. If they grow too large, too quickly, the pumpkin will fall in on itself.