Cucurbita ficifolia x maxima - it's possible

[Hristo]

Hi rhizowen,
Any updates about your progress?

Past 2 years I have played with some Atlantic Giant x moschata and everything is going as expected - lots of sterility, but also and a few viable seeds after backcross x AG. I find this type of breeding quite fun, so I plan next year to try to add and argyrosperma to the pool.
A few years ago I grew ficifolia and could not miss the fact that it grew vigorously and flowered until the frosts. Recently I remembered your project and now I'm planning to try and ficifolia x AG. I wonder did you manage to get some F2's?

[rhizowen]

Hi Hristo

No F2s yet, but I have managed to get another ficifolia x maxima fruit which will hopefully contain some more viable seeds. I haven't opened it yet to check - want to give the seeds the maximum amount of time to ripen properly. C. ficifolia is a great plant for our climate - it was flowering (but not setting fruit) up to the middle of December, months after the pepos and maximas had died. I've been a bit busy to work on it. Let's hope I can find the time to renew my acquaintance with it.

[Hristo]

At least there is a hope. Ficifolia's cold tolerance and it's capability to stay green until frost is really valuable (except for the commercial growers which want dry plants at harvest time). Good luck getting F2s.

[Joseph Lofthouse]

I found an interesting article that grouped the squash into a family tree: www.pnas.org/content/99/1/535/F2.expansion.html

I don't know much about interpreting graphs like that, but Argyrosperma X Moschata seems like a good candidate for an interspecific cross.

[Hristo]

Interesting tree. I have read that pepo, moschata and argyrosperma share a common ancestor, probably they refer to this research. The free shows that argyrosperma and martinezii (C. okeechobeensis subsp. martinezii) are closer relatives than argyrosperma and foetidissima, yet argyrosperma x foetidissima seems easier cross according to: www.hort.purdue.edu/newcrop/1492/cucurbits.html
Quote:
"Hybridization experiments of the taxa belonging to C. argyrosperma with other wild and cultivated taxa of the genus and some field observations have revealed that, with the cultivated species, C. moschata has the highest degree of compatibility. A second level of compatibility consists of the wild and cultivated taxa of C. pepo, some cultivars of C. maxima and the wild perennial species of C. foetidissima H.B.K. A third group is formed by C. lundelliana L. Bailey, and C. martinezii L. Bailey, with which crossings only produced fruit without viable seeds. The fourth and last group includes the perennial species C. pedatifolia L. Bailey, C. digitata A. Gray, in the broad sense and C. radicans Naudin, with which only a few fruits were able to be obtained but generally without viable seeds.
The wild species that have shown some degree of compatibility with the taxa of the complex C. argyrosperma possess genes resistant to some viral diseases that have a high incidence in the cultivated species.
However, because of two factors relating to interspecific crossings, some obstacles will have to be overcome before a successful plant improvement programme including all the taxa is carried out:
-hybrids with viable seeds were not always produced;
-when some success was achieved, the plant receiving the pollen was always from the complex C. argyrosperma and, in the case of the species of the last two groups, it always involved var. palmieri or ssp. sororia."

Agryrosperma x moschata seems relatively easy cross, that is why I will try the argyrosperma x (maxima x moschata) in hope to get a few seeds. Here something more on this:
academic.uprm.edu/lbeaver/Publications/Wessel-Beaver%202000-3%20(arg%20fruit%20set%20in%20moschata).pdf

I notice that overall there is no much data for ficifolia and I hope this is due to lack of interest/research and not due to it's proven hopeless to cross it with maxima/moschata/argyrosperma/pepo. But if rizowen can get ficifolia x maxima at will there is a hope.

[cletus]

cuke.hort.ncsu.edu/cgc/cgc02/cgc2-19.html It looks like its possible to get F2s from pepo x moschata. We can probably crack this nut eventually. In addition to backcrossing, we should try further outcrossing on interspecific F1s. Also pollen mixtures or mentor pollen experiments would be fun to try. It would also be interesting to graft and grow out a young interspecific cucurbit hybrids to a mature foetidissima or ficifolia rootstock before pollenating it. Lets try everything we can to inch closer to a tasty, hardy, perennial, cool tolerant, naked seeded squash that climbs trees.

[12540dumont]

My ficifolia is just sitting there. It's still very small compared to the Whangaparoa Crown from NZ. See it climbing the fence. It ate a watermelon for breakfast.

Attachments:

[castanea]

Sept 6, 2012 10:34:31 GMT -5 12540dumont said:

My ficifolia is just sitting there. It's still very small compared to the Whangaparoa Crown from NZ. See it climbing the fence. It ate a watermelon for breakfast.

This is the time of the year when it starts taking off.

[ottawagardener]

Resurrecting this to say that you are making ficifolia very attractive sounding.

[A guest]

Any updates?

[xdrix]

It may more efficient to cross ficifolia with a blue maxima