GRANDMA, WHERE DO LOOFAHS COME FROM?; COUPLE GROWS GROOMING ITEM IN THE GARDEN: A SCRUBBED ATTEMPT.

Byline: Carol Bidwell Daily News Staff Writer

Most backyard gardeners just can't wait until a crop ripens.

But Peter and Frances De Santis of Reseda can't wait until theirs withers on the vine and becomes dry and leathery in the hot summer sun.

While other Valley gardeners are babying along their tomatoes and zucchini, the De Santises are experimenting this year with loofahs, squashlike gourds that - when dried, seeded and peeled - sell for several dollars apiece in tony bed-and-bath stores as body scrubbers and skin smoothers.

``They're really easy to grow,'' Frances said, looking over the massive vine that covers a backyard fence.

``You start with maybe this many seeds,'' she said, holding perhaps 20 of the flat, black seeds in her hand. ``And you've got this many loofahs,'' she said, waving her arm toward the fruit-laden vine.

``You don't really have to work to grow them. Just plop the seeds in and stand back.''

Frances, 70, said she first read about the gourds a year or so ago in one of the gardening publications she and her husband subscribe to. Both are members of the San Fernando Iris Society and other gardening organizations; their garden, which features many varieties of plants, has been photographed for Sunset magazine.

``I knew there were sponges from the ocean and sponges that you could grow,'' Frances said. ``I wanted to experiment with them. I just love to try new things.''

She sent off for seeds and planted them, but the plants that grew weren't anything like the loofah plants in her gardening book. She tried again and again until she got the right seeds - and their crop took off.

``Thank God, it grows high, not flat,'' Peter said. ``Otherwise it'd cover the back yard. I need that space for my irises.''

An iris hybridizer, Peter, 80, said he agreed to help with the experiment. And he did the hard work, preparing the soil with a heavy addition of mulch, planting the seeds, digging an irrigation trench and training the heavy vines to grow up the fence.

It didn't take long until green tendrils began to appear, followed by bright yellow flowers and cucumber-shaped fruit.

``It was like Jack's beanstalk when it started to grow,'' Frances said.

``And it's continuous growth,'' Peter said. ``There's flowers, young gourds, mature, ripe ones and drying ones, all on the same plant.''

The Mayans were the first to cultivate loofahs as long as 500 years ago; they used the young fruits for food and medicine and the dry gourds for scrubbers, fibrous mats and other uses. They've since been grown in Guatemala and southern Mexico and made into potholders, doormats, table mats, bathroom rugs, gloves, sandals and sun helmets.

During World War II, the U.S. Navy used loofahs for filters in steam engines, and the Army used them to wipe down Jeep windshields; Army surgeons used loofahs as surgical sponges.

When it's young, the fruit tastes a bit like a cucumber, with the flesh surrounded by stringy, fibrous material. While green, the outside of the fruit feels a bit like a thick-skinned zucchini; semi-dried to a light chocolate-brown on the vine, it feels like leather; harvested and dried in the sun, it's hard and brittle.

When the gourds are dry, the seeds rattle around inside like souvenir maracas from Olvera Street.

When several of the gourds ripen, the De Santises set up an assembly line in the back yard to process their experimental crop. Peter cuts off one end of the gourds and granddaughters Christie Branch, 8, and her sister, Taylor, 5, shake out the seeds. Then they soak the dried gourds briefly in a bucket of water. When the peel is supple, they strip it off, leaving only the light brown fibrous interior.

Peter hangs the wet gourds up to dry on a tree in the back yard, and Frances bleaches them to a light beige in a solution of laundry bleach. Then they're cut into chunks large enough for a hand to grip in the shower.

``Sometimes we have to use tin snips to cut them, they're so fibrous and tough,'' Frances said.

Once bleached and dried, the gourds are put away until December, when Frances plans to assemble them into personal toiletry baskets, along with glycerine soap and lace-edged towels, for her friends as Christmas gifts.

Then, the loofah experiment will be over.

``Our woodpile is in there (behind the gourd-covered fence) and we heat our house with the wood, so we'll have to tear it all down when it gets cold,'' Frances said.

``I'm going to cut it all down and fix the fence, and I'm going to grow irises there next year,'' Peter said triumphantly.

``And I'm going to find some more seed and plant something new,'' Frances countered with a grin.

``Either way,'' he said with a laugh, ``we'll be growing something.''

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2 Photos

Photo: (1) Peter De Santis, 80, harvests a loofah from his Reseda garden. He and wife Frances, 70, plan to give the exfoliating sponges as gifts.

(2) Granddaughters Christie, 8, left, and Taylor Branch, 5, help turn he squashlike gourds into usable loofahs.

Evan Yee/Daily News