Marrow · Naples, Campania, Italy
When to plant marrows in Naples
Main outdoor window
14 Mar - 4 Apr
The window this page is built around.
Timed from last spring frost
28 February
In Naples, on your chosen risk.
Ready to pick
1 Aug - 31 Oct
If you plant at the start of the window.
The average last frost. Half of all years are later than this.
Step by step in Naples
Each window is a range, not a single day. Earlier in the range buys you a longer season; later in it buys you a safer one.
Start indoors
7-28 Feb
Three weeks before your last frost, under cover or on a windowsill.
Sow direct
14 Mar - 4 Apr
Two weeks after your last frost.
Plant out
14 Mar - 4 Apr
Two weeks after your last frost.
Harvest
1 Aug - 31 Oct
Marrows through the year
Against the frost risk in Naples
Why these dates
Sow two weeks after the last frost. Let two or three fruits swell per plant and remove the rest, since a plant carrying everything ripens nothing well.
Killed at 0C. Cut and bring the fruit under cover before the first autumn frost, which softens the skin and ends any chance of storing it.
Seed packets and extension guides express timing as weeks either side of the last spring frost, because that is the only reference point that travels. Marrows are timed from 3 weeks before that frost for an indoor start, with planting out 2 weeks after it, and this page simply resolves those offsets against the frost date computed for Naples.
The median frost-free season here is 294 days, against 60 to 80 days to maturity for this crop counted from sowing. That margin is what decides whether a late sowing is worth attempting.
Also in Naples
Other vegetables to time
Growing marrows in Naples
When should I plant marrows in Naples?
Aim for 14 Mar - 4 Apr in an average year. If you would rather not gamble on the weather, wait until 15 Apr - 6 May - by then frost has finished in nine years out of ten.
When will marrows be ready to harvest in Naples?
Expect to start picking around 1 Aug - 31 Oct, based on 60 to 80 days to maturity from the planting date calculated for this location.
How much frost will marrows tolerate?
Killed at 0C. Cut and bring the fruit under cover before the first autumn frost, which softens the skin and ends any chance of storing it.