Remind me. What’s your growing zone?
zone 8b. We are just outside Waco, Texas. We usually have some kind of freeze, though sometimes not till Jan or Feb. Some years, we get many freezes from end of Nov to beginning of March, and other years its 2 nights of freezing weather and that’s it (that was last Winter here). So, cold enough I can’t grow truly tropical things, but not cold enough for most apples and cherries! ah, the joys of the south…. but not true south or utter south…
1 Like
You still have a decent season, probably hot summers. Do you have mostly clay?
Oh, yes, hot summers! And our natural soil is a black clay. But my beds are well amended, for better or for worse. When this area was cleared to build our house, we paid the guy to use a forestry mulcher to mulch all the trees. That was 2.5 years ago, so I have this wonderful crumbly decomposed trees! But it doesn’t hold water at all, so I mix it with the natural clay, and it seems to be working okay. So, I build new beds with cardboard and tree dirt, then add compost. Layering the lazy way for the win! 
1 Like
Good clean tree chips are the best. And the earthworms like them too.
Ha, yes! I totally agree!
1 Like
The watermelons planted beginning of August are fruiting. No way to tell of they’ll have enough time to ripen. I’m not sure if the smaller fruits ripen faster. Anyone know.
1 Like
They usually need close to 90-100 days….but it depends on water and temperature. They like warmer weather abovev80 degrees and water once a week. Also less water during ripening allows for a sweeter melon with good sugars.
90 to 100 days is usually from planting to harvest. I can’t find specific information for flower to harvest. Cantaloupe is apparently about 45 days, and this matches my experience. Tomatoes are about 30 days. Can’t find the specific information for watermelons. I assume it would be at least 45 days.
1 Like
The white seeds appear to be mostly empty. Alot I can tell now are empty that they’re dry. (Big pile)
I picked out some (tiny pile) that seemed the heaviest/thickest to keep and mayyybe they’ll be viable. Plenty of dark seed.
1 Like
Could it be an inter-species hybrid? With citron, maybe?
Yes. That what the guidelines are and they are pretty close to working as long as its warm and they get water. I’ll keep looking too.
Those look like viable white seeds. I hope the watermelon tasted good. I always taste my melons and I don’t save seeds from bland tasting ones.
There isn’t alot of gardens near me, and the ones I do see are the generic handful of tomatoes, peppers, lettuces. Maybe corn, and it all looks like sweet corn. But possible. I only grew the 4 varieties.
Janosik. Early moonbeam. Clay County yellow meat. Leelanau sweetglo.
Thankfully I have plenty of seed left in the packets so I’ll plant some from packets and some saved seed next year.
2 Likes
Stick with it, your garden will flourish. I’m glad your growing a garden in your area.
1 Like
My thought was that someone may have accidentally crossed with citron the previous generation, but if you’re using commercial seeds that’s much less likely.
1 Like
All of the seed i have worked with for the GTS did not include citron. Someone had asked about it as I recall, but did not include those seeds.
Yep, all seed from experimentalfarmnetwork or baker creek.
1 Like
All our watermelons were tiny this year. Maybe they were small because they needed to be thinned out or maybe they needed more consistent watering. Some were tastier than others, most had viable seeds. One pink fleshed one was incredible. Another eight tiny ones were munched on by squirrels or some creature. We grew three full sized blacktail mountain watermelons last year off one single vine in the same part of the garden, so I’m guessing I just need to space out the plantings more next year and thin them to one plant per mound.
1 Like
Nice melons and I’m happy to hear you have viable seed. Be sure to save some seed for your garden and send some seed into GTS. Good to hear from you that the pink flesh is more flavourful as compared to the others.
2 Likes