The green links below add additional plants to the comparison table. Blue links lead to other Web sites.
enable glossary links

Queensland blue or Atlantic giant or Mammoth pumpkin, winter marrow, winter or Hubbard or blue Hubbard or golden Hubbard or Turk's turban or banana or Queensland blue or buttercup or Hokkaido squash, winter squash

coyote gourd, finger-leaf gourd

Habit Plants perennial; roots tuberous.
Stems

usually sprawling, sometimes climbing, often rooting adventitiously at nodes, to 10 m, sparsely hirsute-strigillose with deflexed hairs to hispid-strigose or hirsute-strigose, muriculate or glabrous on ribs;

tendrils 2–5-branched 1–1.5 cm above base, glabrous, often gland-tipped.

Leaves

petiole 3–4(–8) cm, hispid or hispid and hirsute, often with deflexed hairs;

blade depressed-ovate to reniform, palmately 5-lobed, sinuses nearly or completely to petiole, 4–11 × 8–15 cm, usually broader than long, base cordate, lobes narrowly lanceolate to narrowly oblanceolate or oblong-lanceolate, 2–12 cm, margins coarsely toothed or remotely sinuate-dentate to serrate, surfaces hispid to hispidulous, midvein and major veins whitish adaxially, densely hispidulous-strigillose with white hairs, eglandular.

Peduncles

in fruit terete, not prominently ribbed, expanded along whole length, not abruptly expanded at point of fruit attachment, relatively soft and corky-thickened.

in fruit shallowly 5-ribbed, not abruptly expanded at point of fruit attachment, spongy.

Flowers

hypanthium campanulate, 20–25 mm;

sepals subulate to linear, 5–20 mm;

corolla yellow to orange-yellow, campanulate, 5–7(–8) cm;

anther filaments glabrous;

ovary pubescent.

hypanthium cylindric to narrowly campanulate, 2.5–3 mm;

sepals linear-subulate, 3–5 mm;

corolla bright yellow, narrowly campanulate, 4–7 cm;

anther filaments glabrous;

ovary villous-hirsute.

Seeds

whitish to gray or pale brown, suborbiculate to broadly elliptic or obovate, 12–22(–32) mm, margins raised-thickened or not, sometimes slightly darkened, surfaces smooth or slightly rough.

dull white, ovate, obtusely pointed, 8–11 mm, margins thickened-raised, surfaces smooth.

Pepos

green to gray-green with cream stripes or mottling, golden yellow to orange, dark purplish green or bluish, blackish purple, or white to grayish, globose to depressed-globose to ovoid or obovoid, oblong-cylindric, or flattened-cylindric, 10–40 cm, smooth, flesh yellow to orange, not bitter.

dark green with 10 whitish stripes and white mottling or yellow at maturity, globose to depressed-globose or oblong-globose, (6–)7–9.5 cm, smooth, rind thin, hard-shelled.

2n

= 40.

= 40.

Cucurbita maxima

Cucurbita digitata

Phenology Flowering Jun–Oct. Flowering (Feb, Apr–)May–Sep(–Oct).
Habitat Abandoned agricultural fields, fields, roadsides, disturbed sites, trash heaps Larrea desert, often with Acacia, Cercidium, and Yucca, grasslands with Atriplex, mesquite, juniper-scrub, oak savannas (rarely), canal banks, stream bottoms and sides, wash and arroyo banks, dry stream channels, alluvial plains, rocky slopes, disturbed sites, roadsides
Elevation 50–200 m (200–700 ft) (100–)300–1500 m ((300–)1000–4900 ft)
Distribution
from FNA
AR; GA; MA; ME; MI; NC; NY; OH; PA; SC; UT; VA; VT; WI; South America; West Indies [Introduced in North America; introduced also elsewhere in South America (Argentina), Europe (Denmark, England, Germany, Hungary, Spain), Pacific Islands (New Zealand), Australia]
[BONAP county map]
from FNA
AZ; CA; NM; TX; Mexico (Baja California, Chihuahua, Sonora)
[WildflowerSearch map]
[BONAP county map]
Discussion

Cucurbita andreana Naudin, a wild species native to Argentina and Bolivia, hybridizes readily with C. maxima and is its ancestor (O. I. Sanjur et al. 2002); it sometimes is recognized as C. maxima subsp. andreana (Naudin) Filov.

Some fruits of Cucurbita maxima have a high sugar content and are used for making pies, and they are popular as a soup, especially in Brazil and Africa.

All of the giant pumpkins in weigh-off contests are derived from Cucurbita maxima, as are some of the Halloween pumpkins. In 1904, the largest pumpkin was 403 pounds, and winners increased relatively little to 459 pounds in 1980. A rapid increase in size began in 1981, with the champion at 493.5 pounds; from this individual’s lineage came seeds for the Atlantic Giant cultivar, which has contributed since to winners burgeoning in size. The first giant pumpkin over 1000 pounds (1061 pounds) was grown in 1996; by 2009 the winner was 1725 pounds and in 2010, 1810 pounds.

(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)

In Texas, Cucurbita digitata is known by a single collection, from southeastern Presidio County in 1975, along gravelly banks of Fresno Creek (M. L. Butterwick 1980).

Leaves of juvenile plants or the first growth of the season of Cucurbita digitata produce shorter and broader lobes, but mature leaves are similar to those of C. palmata (R. S. Felger 2000). Cucurbita digitata and C. palmata intergrade where their ranges meet in southwestern Arizona, southeastern California, and northeastern Baja California; with C. cordata S. Watson and C. cylindrata L. H. Bailey of Baja California, they form a group of closely related, allopatric, mostly intergrading species (W. P. Bemis and T. W. Whitaker 1965, 1969).

(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)

Source FNA vol. 6, p. 56. FNA vol. 6, p. 51.
Parent taxa Cucurbitaceae > Cucurbita Cucurbitaceae > Cucurbita
Sibling taxa
C. digitata, C. ficifolia, C. foetidissima, C. melopepo, C. moschata, C. okeechobeensis, C. palmata, C. pepo
C. ficifolia, C. foetidissima, C. maxima, C. melopepo, C. moschata, C. okeechobeensis, C. palmata, C. pepo
Name authority Duchesne: Essai Hist. Nat. Courges, 7, 12. (1786) A. Gray: Smithsonian Contr. Knowl. 5(6): 60. (1853)
Web links