South Anna Butternut Squash

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C. moschata. I'm very excited about this squash and I think you will be too. It's really delicious--sweeter than other butternuts, with a small seed cavity, and smooth, bright orange flesh. It's more disease-resistant than other squashes, with strong resistance to downy mildew and other fungus plagues. In my trial in California, it did great in our hot dry days and cold nights. The vigorous vines were trouble-free and matured sweet mature fruit, even with a late June planting. I ate luscious squash all winter and through the spring. Matures a few days after Waltham, about 100 days from sowing.

South Anna is an example of the very best sort of independent breeding project. Instead of just working with modern butternuts, Edmund Frost started his project with an ancient Native American heirloom, the Seminole Pumpkin. That's a moschata squash like the butternut, but sweeter, resistant to downy mildew, and extremely long-keeping. However, the fruit is small and needs a long season to ripen. He crossed the Seminole heirloom with workhorse variety Waltham Butternut, and selected over ten years for downy mildew resistance, productivity, flavor, sweetness, dry matter content, keeping quality, and butternut shape. Exterior color is a deeper tan than most butternuts. The majority of fruits are 3-4 pounds. To cap all that, it is pledged to the Open Source Seed Initiative, so it will remain in the public domain for seed savers. A hard-to-find treasure. 15 seeds per packet.


The Breeder says that "South Anna will avoid the crop failure that can occur in years when downy mildew comes early, and provide a better quality harvest in years with average DM pressure. The healthier foliage leads to sweeter, riper fruits. Brix [sugar], dry matter and flavor ratings of South Anna have been consistently higher than other butternuts in our trials at Twin Oaks Seed Farm. When used as a late planting, South Anna grows strong until frost, allowing for later harvests that will keep better into the winter. Strong, vigorous, fully vining plants. OSSI variety

The Open Source Seed Initiative exists so that breeders who originate new varieties can protect them from exploitation and patenting by corporations. It means that the breeder has freely given up their patent rights in order to keep the variety in the public domain forever. The OSSI pledge reads: "You have the freedom to use these OSSI-pledged seeds in any way you choose. In return, you pledge not to restrict others' use of these seeds or their derivatives, by patents or other means, and to include this pledge in any transfer of these seeds or their derivatives."