Also known as bottle gourd, calabash, or birdhouse gourd, it grows in a variety of shapes and sizes, and produces fruit that has been used for millennia in the crafting of containers, dishes, and other useful implements. Its vining branches can be trained on trellises to grow a cool, shaded hideaway from the kids, and the dangling fruit can be harvested and dried, then decorated and hollowed out to make homes for wild birds.
