Friend or foe?

[DanielleS]

Hi everyone, I've attached some photos of either a plant or weed that wants to take over our garden. When my husband and I planted the garden several months ago, we thought we only planted cucumbers in that area but, with a 2-yr-old, our memories are not the best. Therefore, we may have also planted squash. This plant's leaves are very similar to that of the cucumber in shape and texture but are significantly larger (much larger than my head -- though I could measure if it'd be more helpful). In the past few weeks, it has sprouted star-shaped gold flowers as well, though none of flowers have yet to turn over to fruit. It also has vines, similar to the cucumber, that attach to and coil around everything in its path. It is a climbing vine with a very thick stem and the leaves, though their vine stem runs along the ground, stand as high as 1-2 feet tall. It has climbed roughly 6+ feet across the garden at this point. Basically, I'm wondering if I am tending to a very large weed at this point or if we did actually plant some sort of squash and had just forgotten. If so, what is the best way to re-route this squash so it doesn't completely take over my mint, celery, and green peppers?? Any help or ideas is much appreciated! P1030250.jpgP1030252.jpgP1030251.jpgP1030249.jpg

[KarenZone3A]

Hello there,
that's no weed :)
but it is about to take over your garden. It is a squash or pumpkin of some sort. The seed might have been in compost or something if you didn't plant it. It will take over as it will continue to grow so if you can you can redirect the runners out of your raised bed and onto the lawn or if your mint and celery etc are more important to you, you can pull the squash plant out now before it shades out your other things. there is probobly just not room enough in that bed for everything so you will need to decide what is most important to you.
Karen

[DanielleS]

Thank you! Any idea if we can just prune it back? I'm just so curious why we have no "fruit" yet, though. Well, I guess we'll see. Thanks again!

[KarenZone3A]

hello,

You can prune it back but that will reduce your chances of it producing (whatever it plans to produce) fruit for you. Depending where you garden, it is getting later in the season so hopefully you won't run out of time before frost comes. It would be fun to see what it does.
K