What's Growing
Plant Name: Baby Pam Pumpkin
Latin Name: Cucurbita Pepo
Grown From: Virginia Tech Indigenous Community Garden (2021)
Native To Region:
This pumpkin heirloom has been a staple going back to the early 1600s for the New England and Maine region of the United States.
Indigenous Tribes/People that Cultivated The Plant:
The Wabanaki Confederacy which consists of Algonquian-speaking communities (Passamaquoddy, Mi’kmaq, Maliseet, Passamaquoddy, and Penobscot) grew these pumpkins as a staple crop. As stated by Abenaki Scholar and Paleoethnobotanist Fred Wiseman and Anna Roy-Wiseman, “Fall harvest festivals were hosted by those of the Wabanaki, and the "Three Sisters" were frequently served during the festivities. The planting of this well-known companion planting of corn, beans, and squash as well as the significance of their cultivation has been well chronicled.”
Description:
Known as “ Small Sugar Pie Pumpkin”. A delicious, dry, stringless pumpkin typically ranges in diameter from 17 to 20 inches and weighs 4 to 5 pounds. Baby Pam is one of the greatest pumpkins for creating pies because its dry, starchy flesh blends well with sugar and water. These pumpkins are fantastic for painting and carving because of their beautiful aspect. When kept in a cold, dry environment, they will last for a few months. These pumpkins are sold as a standard pumpkin at farmers markets, grocery stores, and seed catalogs. These pumpkins were one of a variety of volunteers growing in the Indigenous Community Garden.
Life Cycle: Annual
Days to Emergence: 7 to 10 days
Harvest Period: 105 to 120 days
Plant Advice:
Select the part of your garden that receives the most sun. Working with organic soil that has a pH range of 5.5 to 6.5. In hills or mounds outdoors, scatter 5 to 7 seeds. Early spring to mid-summer, three weeks after the last frost, and when the soil has warmed to at least 70 F are the best times to plant. Plants can grow up to 2 feet tall, and vines can extend 10 feet.
Companion Plants To Grow With:
One of the Three Sisters; Fix nitrogen in the soil
Grow it close to your squash in the garden to keep pests away from your corn and squash
Provides cover and shade to keep moisture
Attracts beneficial insects like lacewings and ladybugs that eat squash bugs
Attract pollinators for pumpkins, tomatoes, and corn. Beware! Marigolds can reduce the number of nematodes in your soil bed. Marigolds can also attract helpful bugs like parasitic wasps that eat harmful pests. Deer and squash bug repellent
Attract pollinators for pumpkins, tomatoes, and corn. Beware! Marigolds can reduce the number of nematodes in your soil bed. Marigolds can also attract helpful bugs like parasitic wasps that eat harmful pests. Deer and squash bug repellent
Repelling striped cucumber beetles, cabbage loopers, and squash bugs by drawing them toward the plants. Plant nasturtiums a safe distance away from your squash to reap the plants’ benefits.
Works to enhance the sweetness of pumpkin for the harvest period while its aroma keeps pests and deer away. And conserves soil moisture.
These are great for attracting squash bugs for the less desired pumpkins. Assist the yield for pollination of squash flowers. Be cautious on the type of pumpkins/squash grown together due to cross-bredding.
Fix nitrogen in the soil which is essential for yield growth and improve soil conditions
Deters cucumber beetles and squash borers
An ornamental plant that tolerates drought and salt spray. It emits a strong scent that protects plants from pests and diseases.
Provides cover and mulch. These are great for attracting squash bugs.
Create a live vertical trellis for some pumpkins. A natural pollinator for bees. They attract birds with their seeds which also consume the pests.
Repels all kinds of pests such as ants, flies, fleas, moths, mosquitoes, ticks, and even mice. Great Pollinators for honey bees and ladybugs. Ladybugs will seek out tansy to lay their eggs on.
Attracts a wide variety of pollinators and is especially favored by lacewings, a beneficial insect, for egg-laying habitat. Lacewing larvae are voracious predators of aphids, whiteflies, cabbage moth caterpillars, and many others. Reducing soil erosion with its deep, fibrous roots. Pest and Deer resistant.
A great cover crop and provider for pollinators. Provide nitrogen into the soil and erosion prevention
Uses:
Pam pumpkins work best when cooked, such when they're roasted, steamed, or baked. They can also be used in muffins, tarts, bread, custards, pudding, cakes, and cookies. They are well known for their use as the filling in pumpkin pies. Additionally, they can be boiled and pureed to create savory dips, hearty soups, stews, curries, tamales, and even quesadillas.
Recipes:
Plant Name: Cherokee Nation Candy Roaster
Latin Name: Cucurbita Maxima
Grown From: Virginia Tech Indigenous Community Garden (2021)
Native to Region:
This squash has been referred to as the pie filling pumpkin for “Appalachian Thanksgiving”. Originated from the regions of Appalachia, western North Carolina, eastern Tennessee, and northern Georgia.
Indigenous Tribes/People that Cultivated The Plant:
This squash was bred by members of the Cherokee Nation in the early 1800s
Description:
Candy roasters are known for their distinct shape and their nutty pumpkin-like flavor. As a winter squash, its resistant storability (spanning to over six months) causes its flesh to sweeten over time. This winter squash can grow to be as heavy as 15 pounds and as long as an adult forearm. This squash is high in Vitamin A, Vitamin C, and fiber.
Life Cycle: Annual
Days of Emergence: 7 to 14 days
Harvest Period: 100 to 130 days
Uses: Foods like pumpkin pies, breads, jam,
Plant Name: haspahínukma:ta:xe Yesa or (Tutelo Strawberry Corn)
Latin Name: Zea Mays
Grown From: Virginia Tech Indigenous Community Garden
Native to Region: Additionally, the haspahínukma:ta:xe is well adapted to Piedmont and Mountain climates in Virginia due to its long history of cultivation here being.
Indigenous Tribes/People that Cultivated The Plant:
haspahínukma:ta:xe Yesa (Tutelo Strawberry Corn), this corn is tied to the Monacan people specifically. The displacements relating to the conflicts of the Mourning Wars with the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois Confederacy) caused members of Yesah (Tutelo people) to be brought up North and merged with the Gayogo̱hó꞉nǫʼ (Cayuga of the Haudenosaunee). This corn was one of the artifacts relating to the displacement of the Yesah people and it was because of Yesah seedkeepers' efforts that the corn came back home.
Description:
The Virginia Tech Indigenous Community garden prioritizes haspahínukma:ta:xe to recognize the contributions of the original caretakers of this land occupied by Virginia Tech and showcase the importance of land acknowledgment obligations into serving the Indigenous communities.
We credited this translation in reference to the corn to Corey Roberts (Occaneechi) and the language coordination efforts of Desiree Shelley (Monacan). “Haspahínukma” the term for “strawberry” referring to this corn originated through the observation of colonizers. Evidence of the corn being described as "ma:ta:xe" as the Yesah people as their corn.
This corn is short corn that often grows two cobs. haspahínukma:ta:xe Yesa is described, during it is green husk stages, as having a very syrupy sweet taste.
Life Cycle: Annual
Days of Emergence: 8 to 14 days
Harvest Period: 90 to 95 days
Uses: This corn is an sweet and flour corn. This corn uses in the incorporation into traditional foods like Hominy, Corn cakes, grits, cornbread, and tortillas. The corn silk can be used for tea as medicine for urinal tract infections and bladder problems. The husks can be woven into baskets, mats, ropes, and make corn husks dolls. The husks are corn leaves that can be dried and ground into flour. Husks are also used to make corn husk dolls. The leaves can also be used to wrap tamales fillings and smoke fish.
Planting Advice:
Great conditions for the soil pH of 6.0-6.8. Need soil that is rich with nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium. During the period of germination to harvest, this corn needs about 1 inch of water per week.
Mounding is a traditional technique that is incorporated through the practices of agricultural Indigenous communities. This technique would argue being tied to the Three Sister cultivation of growing corn, beans, squash.
The row planting method that was introduced into cultivation of the Indigenous Community Garden from our Monacan Elder and Garden Caretaker, Victoria Ferguson and her family and the Yesahi community. The row planting applied with the Three Sisters method that was introduced into cultivation of the Indigenous Community Garden from our Monacan Elder, Victoria Ferguson and the Yesahi community. When planting corn in hills, spaced out between 12 to 18 inches round. I do usually “mound” it up a bit, maybe 3 or 4 inches high is all.
Large Circle planting method is known as a more preferred method for corn growth, which Rob Nelson (Lipan Apache Tribe of Texas) shared their knowledge about this growing corn technique. This technique increases sweet corn production, conserves more water, and provides more stability for excessive wind blows.