Modern gourds like pumpkins typically taste sweet, while their wild relatives are incredibly bitter. At the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History, archaeobotanist Logan Kistler studies how cultivated gourds gained their flavor. Bunches and Bits Karina, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 There’s always that friend who goes gourd-crazy in the fall. But for some, this seasonal obsession is a lifelong profession. At the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History, one scientist has made a career of studying ancient gourds and other crops to understand more about the roots of plant domestication. In this “Meet a SI-entist,” archaeobotanist Logan Kistler shares how he became interested in plant and human relationships and the knowledge…