Duration: Perennial

Nativity: Native

Lifeform: Vine

General: Perennial prostrate vine with deep root, slender branches distantly run, but rarely climb; slender stems, glabrous, ribbed, whitish-pustulate with flat oval trichomes on anges, tendrils shot-petiolate, 3-5 parted, branches gland tipped.

Leaves: Five-cleft nearly to base of blade, lobes 4-10 cm long, linear-lanceolate to linear-oblanceolate, variably sublobed, green, bearing conic trichomes above and below, sometimes paler below; stout petioles, ribbed, shorter than lobes, muricate and hispid.

Flowers: Calyx cylindric to narrowly campanulate, 4-6 cm long, sparsely hispid, tube 2.5-3 cm long, lobes subulate, 3-5 mm long, corolla sparsely hispid, bright yellow.

Fruits: Globose, vivid dark green with 10 narrow stripes and variably speckled.

Ecology: Found in sandy alluvial soil of washes and valleys or on dry plains and mesas; 5,000 ft (1524 m); flowers June-October.

Distribution: s CA, s AZ, sw NM, sw TX; south to n MEX.

Notes: Highly distinct plant--hard to mistake simply due to a combination of the leaves and the crawling vine habit. Also, when flowering, smell it. You-ll know if it is not C. foetitissima.

Ethnobotany: The Gila Pima roasted the seeds and ate them.

Etymology: Cucurbita is the Latin name for gourd, digitata means lobed like fingers.

Synonyms: None

Editor: SBuckley 2010, FSCoburn 2015