It was mid-October 2025 and we were about to get our first deep freeze of the season. I suddenly realized that my loofah's were still outside growing, and if they froze, it could ruin the gourds that had entirely overtaken my whole garden. If I wasn't able to use them, would the whole gardening season be a loss?
So I pulled up Google to try to help me understand what to do. Would it be better to leave them outside? If I picked them now, would they even turn into sponges, or would they just mold and be useless?
It was so hard to find the answer I was looking for, so I decided to write this blog post to hopefully help the next person who is in a panic over loofahs!
I planted the loofah seeds a little late in the season - at the end of June - because we hadn't set up our raised garden bed yet. The plants grew FAST though, and soon swallowed everything else growing there, including beans, peppers, amaranth, and it started growing on top of the tomatoes, bringing the tomato cages down with it.
I decided to let it grow - I was excited to see how many loofah gourds I would get. They were starting to pop up everywhere along the vine.
After I harvested all of the gourds, I first tried a technique that I saw where you put the gourds in the oven at the lowest setting to dry them out. I may not have done it for long enough, but this did not work for me. The gourd became very mushy, and I ended up throwing it out.
Around this time, we were about to go out of town for a while, so I decided to try the technique where you just leave the gourds alone and let them dry on their own. I set up a fan at its lowest setting and aimed it at my little collection of gourds. When we returned, there were several that were totally dry.
I started to try taking the skins off of them, and sure enough, it had worked! Some of the sponge part was a little bit weak for some, so I cut that part off, but overall, my harvest was saved!
At this time, I also didn't realize there was a gourd or two that I had missed out in the garden. As I was cleaning the area up for the winter, I discovered them. Some were too small to have ever been able to use, but one grew pretty large out there, even through the freeze. It was even larger than the ones I had harvested pre-frost as it had warmed up after the freeze, and I imagine it happily continued to grow for a little while longer. This sponge definitely looks more developed than the others that I harvested, but it is also darker than the other sponges, as seen in the below photo.
I will definitely grow these again next gardening season, but will start them earlier in the season (right after danger of frost), and I might try leaving more out if there is a freeze. I think I will grow them along one side of our fence, so there will be lots of room for the vines to take over.
My next step is getting some soap made with my very own homegrown loofah sponges. Stay tuned for when I am able to put those up for sale!