Growing Gourds in Hot Climates

Most articles on growing gourds are written for folks who live in temperate regions.  The advice is usually to plant them in full sun, water them occasionally and otherwise leave them alone.  Sound advice, I assume, if you live in places where summer temps hover in the 80s with an occasional push into the 90s.  But you need a different strategy if you want to grow gourds in places where 100° Fahrenheit is common.  In South Texas westward to Southern Arizona temps can go even higher.

I use gourds mainly for birdhouses; in fact, I think the prettiest purple martin houses are made with gourds.  But they also make excellent water containers, bowls, decorative pieces, musical instruments, rattles and even flower pots.  I saw a fellow once who made flutes with gourds.

Gourds are not hard to grow in desert climes.  First, don’t plant them in full sun.  They will wilt and use so much energy trying to survive the heat they’ll simply remain dwarfed.  In other words, the plant will stay but a few inches high and no more.  You must plant them in the shade.  I planted gourds beside mesquite trees in front of my house and placed dried carrizo (Phragmites australis) alongside the plants to aid in climbing.  IMPORTANT: You must water the plants daily.  You need not soak the plants but instead give them a healthy sprinkling.  Otherwise, the intense heat will burden the plants and they won’t produce many flowers.  I start my gourds in cardboard oatmeal containers.  Everyone has a “comfort food” and mine is oatmeal.  Sprinkle blueberries or dried cranberries on top and you’ve got a great meal.  Empty cardboard oatmeal boxes make perfect planters because once the seedling is a few inches high I transplant the box into the ground where it quickly rots to rejoin the soil it came from.

This year I performed an experiment to see which plants would thrive given a variable.  One group was planted in direct sun as advocated by many articles.  The other group was planted in shade alongside my mesquite trees.  Within about four weeks the results were dramatic.  The gourd seeds planted in full sun had struggled to survive despite daily dousing.  By the end of the day the plants looked horrible.  They were always wilted and seemed about ready to die.  The water of course revived them but they didn’t grow beyond a few inches in height.  The seeds planted alongside the mesquites on-the-other-hand thrived.  They took off like rockets heading skyward.  In just four weeks the shaded gourds were already several feet high.  I felt guilty about the gourds planted in full sun so I transplanted them next to other mesquite trees and fortunately all of them seem to be getting along nicely.  They aren’t as big as the plants originally placed alongside the trees but I think they’ll catch up.

Notice how these plants are smaller than those in the photos above.  These gourds are playing catchup as they were originally planted in full sun and did poorly under those conditions.

I’m going to keep posting articles on the gourds showing you how they are doing.  Afterward we’ll make some bird houses and a few other things.  I also planted some estropajo (est-tro-pah-ho) Luffa cylindrical alongside some of my mesquite trees.  They are doing nicely as the photo below attests.

This is a busy time of year and I’ve not had much time to post.  In South Texas the dog days of summer are called, la canicula.  Days drag out and the heat is oppressive.  But there’s a white noise in the woods that’s quite soothing.  Cicadas drone from the mesquites, brasils and granjeno.  Ghost doves and mourning doves coo softly from the deeper woods.  I haven’t seen any rattlesnakes, knock on wood.  Neither have I seen any long distance travelers.  South Texas has endured serious grief in the last few months.  Meanwhile politicians and various advocacy groups and whatnot squabble amongst each other.  Meanwhile the people of the region are held hostage in the middle.  But of course no one seems to care.  I work in my little shop in the evenings a pistol strapped to my waist.  Calls from distant neighbors saying their dogs have alerted to things that might have evil intent.  At ten o’clock in the night the temps are still in the high 80s.  Close by a great-horned owl begins hooting.  A haunting echo.  I look up into the sky and see the full moon sliding behind clouds moving west by northwest.  I can hear a dog barking.  I know that dog.  It lives at a little ranch three miles to the south.  A wind scorpion scurries about the floor at my shop looking for ants.  I completed a few new knives.  Just for fun, a nice hobby.  Full tanged survival type knives.  It keeps the old man occupied and distracted.  Some Border Patrol dropped by to visit.  They like my large choppers.  I tell them they’d be better off with the new smaller full tang designs.  One of them says, “Mr. Longoria I think you're right.  These are definitely more practical.”  But they are fascinated by the big choppers.  Ah, youth.  By the time you become wise it’s time to go away.  No wonder things never change.