Annual with extremely rough sometimes trailing stems and flower stalks. Leaves more or less ovate, toothed, lobed, each lobe with a small point. Flowers with lobes erect and terminated by a small point, mostly orange-yellow. Fruit variously shaped, mostly orange or green. Stalk short, deeply furrowed, widest at the joint with the fruit. Seed white, thick-edged.

Garden origin

A plant arising in cultivation, the source probably N America.

A difficult genus taxonomically with numerous cultivars and sometimes divided into the following botanical varieties:

var. melopepo (L.) Alef. Other pumpkins and squashes that mature in summer. Not a running variety.

var. pepo Vegetable Marrow or Pumpkin; a trailing plant which produces fruit in autumn: there is a range of cultivars. Used for pumpkin pie. Commercially available cultivars include: 'Arlesa', 'Black Belt', 'Fordhook', 'Gold Lance', 'Green Buttons', 'Greyzini', 'Little Dumpling', Nightrider™, 'Regal Supreme', 'Sun Drops', 'Table Queen', 'Vegetable Spaghetti', 'Zorro'.

Source: Spencer, R. (1997). Cucurbitaceae. In: Spencer, R.. Horticultural Flora of South-eastern Australia. Volume 2. Flowering plants. Dicotyledons. Part 1. The identification of garden and cultivated plants. University of New South Wales Press.