re-creating Goldini and Sandwich Slice squash

[diane]

Carol Deppe wrote about creating several squash, but only a couple made it into commerce - Sweet Meat - Oregon Homestead, and Candystick Dessert Delicata.

Two others are not available, but I think some of us could attempt to re-create them.

Sandwich Slice rated an entire chapter of her first book, Breed Your Own Vegetable Varieties. She developed it in 1998, trying to develop a large version of Sugar Loaf. Her description of her planning is very interesting, but her plans were thwarted by bad weather, so Sandwich Slice was an accidental result of crossing Connecticut Field (a large pumpkin) with an F1 of Sugar Loaf X a bush acorn. One plant produced delicious fruit that she ate raw.

The other is Goldini which has been pledged to OSSI. There have been quite a few queries about where to buy seeds, but none seem available.

Carol describes how she developed it here: osseeds.org/goldini-zucchini/

Seeds of the two original parents should still be available. I already have seeds of Costata Romanesco and will just have to buy Gold Rush hybrid zucchini (Seminis).

Diane Whitehead

[triffid]

Best of luck with this project. I had also considered doing my own crosses of Costata Romanesco & Gold Rush F1. Has Sandwich Slice ever been offered for sale?
I'm not sure if Gold Rush F1 is an actual hybrid. Some open-pollinated seed companies here sell it as just 'Gold Rush'; it may be an instance of being labeled F1 to put off growers from saving their own seed.

[diane]

I have never seen Sandwich Slice seeds for sale, and Carol did not mention it in her next two books.

In her third book, The Tao of Vegetable Gardening, she again was trying to develop a bigger Sugar Loaf, which was her aim when she grew Sandwich Slice. Instead, she developed Candystick.

She wrote: a cross between a delicata and a big pumpkin with poor eating quality would involve dozens, perhaps even hundreds of genes affecting fruit size and quality, with nearly all the genes for poor quality being dominant. I would likely have to grow hundreds or even thousands of plants for generations in order to recover a plant with good delicata flavor and quality. I wasn't up for it."

In the spring of 2000 Carol was planning to sow the selfed seeds of Sandwich Slice, but that is the last heard. I guess it didn't work out.

Gold Rush was a 1980 AAS Vegetable Winner

This is what was written at the time it won: Gold Rush hybrid squash is a bright waxy golden-yellow squash with the shape and taste of zucchini.

There are no details about its parentage, though.

I guess I'll buy seeds of all the yellow zucchini I can find, and see how they taste, then cross some with Costata Romanesco.

[prairiegardens]

Does anyone know what the story is with Carole? I hope she is ok. Like others have said, I got no reply to my email asking about Goldini and the Beefy Resilient Bean Grex.. I have found the bean(s)

for sale in a couple of places but it seems to come to Canada I would have to get it from Ireland...still looking. Not a sniff about Goldini other than her own post in the 2018 catalog and OSSI...she seems to have just dropped off the face of the planet.

[billw]

I saw Goldini growing at her farm in August, so she's still working on it. I think she has more correspondence than she can keep up with.

[keen101 (Biolumo / Andrew B.)]

I know Carol hasn't been heard from since early 2019, but last she said she had plenty of seed. Might be worth multiple people trying to order seed again.

opensourceplantbreeding.org/forum/index.php?topic=84

[c2h6]

I've been thinking about recreating the 'Goldini' squash after reading your other post, Diane. 'Costata Romanesco' and 'Goldrush' are fairly easy to find. However, I was looking at Johnny's Seeds and they have some hybrids of 'Costata Romanesco' ('Pantheon' and 'Flaminio'), as well as a yellow squash that looks like it has some 'Costata Romanesco' in it called 'Goldmine'. www.johnnyseeds.com/vegetables/squash/summer-squash/goldmine-f1-zucchini-squash-seed-3845.html?cgid=summer-squash#sz=18&start=1

I'm curious how that one compares, but maybe it would be a starting point to de-hybridize it and select something similar to 'Goldini'.

Ethan

[diane]

Before the current rush on seeds, i bought every yellow zucchini I could find, but that wasn't many. Yellow, from Mr Fothergill in the UK, Goldy and Yellowfin from Westcoast Seeds in Canada.

At least I have Costata Romanesco. It's a beginning.

[triffid]

There are a few others diane - Orelia F1, Sunstripe F1, Shooting Star F1 (vining), Buckingham F1, Rheinau Gold, Burpees Golden, Early Straightneck, Lemon, and the varieties listed here www.kcb-samen.ch/category/1453_1/Yellow-Courgettes

Because I'm growing Lemon again and Gelber Englischer Custard this year, and not Gold Rush, I'll try my luck with a few crosses to Costata Romanesco.

Yellowfin and Goldy look nice, particularly luminous
Had a quick look at what Fothergill's has on offer but couldn't find on called Yellow - they do have a good half-dozen other yellow varieties though.

[diane]

I'm also growing Lemon, for the first time, and Gelber Englischer Custard.

Sunstripe didn't germinate (old seed) but some new seed of a golden zucchini hasn't germinated either. That's not the only new squash seed I've had that won't germinate. It is possible that a strong shell can have nothing inside it, though I thought seed companies were required to do germination tests.

Well, I think I have enough zucchini for this year. I have to leave room for winter squash and all the other vegetables. I don't have much space that gets sunshine. Too many giant conifers in the neighbourhood.

[prairiegardens]

According the Steve Solomon the nutrient value of commercial vegetables is way lower than the nutrient value of many of the heritage varieties, something I've read in numerous other places as well. It would be interesting to have an easy way to test for that, certainly often the flavour leaves a whole lot to be desired from the stuff offered for sale in the stores. It's also been reported that flavour and nutrient value are related. Johnnies and a few others who cater to the "aware"? crowd are not the commercial seed suppliers I'm talking about though, they are the exception to the "commercial" farmers working hand in glove with big Ag, imo.

[steev]

Yeah; the first qualities sought in commercial crops are shippability and appearance; flavor and nutrition are not that important.

[diane]

The yellow zucchinis I am growing aren't going to produce female flowers, except for Goldy F1

Goldy has had 11 male flowers and 8 female ones. I've pollinated each of them with Romanesco pollen. It hasn't produced a female flower yet, but a dozen male ones.
I'm eating a Goldy tonight.

Of the other four yellows, only Yellowfin has a female flower forming.

I can see why people started eating male flowers.

[diane]

Ellendra on the opensourceplantbreeding forum tried to trick a squash requiring long night hours into blooming despite the short night where it was growing. She stepped on the ends of the vines, just enough to bruise them. They bloomed.

So maybe we should try that, though it is a bit more difficult if we're growing bush squash.

[readrobread]

Hi all - I'm another huge fan of Carol Deppe's work, and unfortunately, one of the previous people who didn't get in order that was paid for in 2017.

This year, after so many (mostly extremely polite, and occasionally a bit annoyed!) emails to her, I've decided to just try and get the varieties she's developed that I'm interested in from various other sources. Also reading her Breed Your Own Vegetables book right now, and intrigued about Sandwich Slicer. Too bad it arose from such a complex (ie. loads of really variable F2s from the sound of it) breeding project, and at least presently, is lost. I'm put off by the prospect of how many of the squash would turn out to be bad flavored - and don't have enough space in production to grow that much potential non-food at the moment.

Goldini - I'm very thankful for the information online about how it was bred (there is also a podcast you can easily google, with some further details). I'm planning to basically copy the method (though different seed sources for the two parents) this season, and follow it out. From her description, it seems like there were lots of candidates, but she chose the best for her criteria. I'll do the same for my slightly different criteria.

Beefy Grex - the real reason I posted today was to let you know a North American place to order Beefy Grex soup bean: www.resilientseeds.com/

I put in an order recently for Canada, so know they ship here! They also have the Cascade Ruby Gold Corn that Carol developed, and Fortex pole beans, which she mentions as a favourite of hers.