# WATERMELON 2026 European Focus Crop **URL:** \ **Category:** Cucurbits\ **Tags:** europe, watermelon, focus-crops-europe\ **Created:** [November 24, 2025, 10:01am UTC](https://goingtoseed.discourse.group/t/watermelon-2026-european-focus-crop/4400 "2025-11-24T10:01:46Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 1\ **Showing post:** 7
**Author:** ![ThomasPicard](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex031/user_avatar/goingtoseed.discourse.group/thomaspicard/32/6491_2.png) [@ThomasPicard](https://goingtoseed.discourse.group/u/ThomasPicard)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2025, 8:11am UTC](https://goingtoseed.discourse.group/t/watermelon-2026-european-focus-crop/4400/7 "2025-11-29T08:11:30Z")
> [@rsalzman](#): > > In general I have a particular preference for smaller watermelons, so I wonder if we might want to make choices as to what we are looking for, or have to grexes for smaller and bigger? Hi Rachel! Personnally after a few years of growth I know that I can adjust my calibers just by changing planting densities : the densier the smaller. It’s also making crop slightly ealier. For example last year my calibers at 4plants/m2 were averaging at 2.0kg, at 2 plants/m2 they were at 2.7kg or so. And I hatvest more weight at 4 than at 2plants/m2 : 4,5 vs 4kg/m2. Plastic tarp, no input, zero watering. > [@rsalzman](#): > > I’m curious about watermelons for storage as well. > [@rsalzman](#): > > Any experience or curiosity there? If you want to go on that path try Navajo Winter, which stores well, is pink inside and quite nice. Personnally I’ve had a project of long storage watermelon running for 3 years… which I abandonned few days ago ! those in pic all went to the compost after opening… because the taste just isn’t there. ![IMG_20251127_130136](https://canada1.discourse-cdn.com/flex031/uploads/landracegardening/original/3X/3/0/30f056353a867bd28d9ca3366e6a49d8a2c452ea.jpeg) My understanding is that - Globally the sweeter it is the more prone it is to decay. So I don’t see how I could get a sweet, nice, crispy and juicy watermelon for Christmas - There is possibly a necessity to sow those known “storage watermelon” later and so harvest them later to really get them good for Christmas. Otherwise I just can’t get my head around it, after years trying : getting 1 very good last year on the 15/11 and zero this year on the 25th is just not satisfying. Though I did put into it something like 15 varieties called “long storage”. So there must be a trick. Also consider that behind those 15 or so fruits there was 30 others already composted, which decayed in october and november… I did buy a giant watermelon in an Amish farm in Vermont by the end of October which was just harvested out of a small pile of “the last ones”. Was delicious and juicy. Harvesting a watermelon that late means to me late sowing (end of june? July?), and it still doesn’t say if it would store. Got seeds of those if anyone interested. I also had 2 other watermelon populations, just differentiated by earliness (“early”, and “standard”) but I decided to fusion those for simplicity, and also because I think in my climate it wasn’t relevant : earliness still is first criteria… so bye bye “long storage” and then fusionning the rest… now I’m just focusing on just one population : - early vigor selection (_sowing many seeds + keeping few plants_), - from next year on cold germination will be my new and main big “selection pressure” (_I’ll sow them around the 1st-15th of April instead of the 15th of May - and that is to try getting more precocity : start harvesting before August_), - then of course amazing taste is what triggers seed saving. And for reasons I won’t delve into right now, but because “amazing taste” is pretty subjective, and having had _ **measured** _ **failures** in terms of improvment of selection in 2025 despite spending tens of hours in selection in 2024, and assessing thzt selection as _too subjective_, I decided that before any taste assessment I will do a BRIX measurement (_so a sugar measurement_) before any taste assessment : I’ll discard anything under 10% + anything under 1-1,5kg. Then do taste assesment, looking for aroma complexity and of course the more basic but absolute necessary crispiness. Behind that a coherence with the quest for **vigor** : - **sugar level + weight** ensures me a relative _objectivity_ in my pre-selection (relatively to harvest date that indicates clearly that a plant has been particularly efficient at photosynthetizing those high energy compounds), - then my **taste assesment concentring on aroma complexity** goes with the lines of James White, John Kempf, Harriet Mella and others : yes it’s partially “subjective” but behind our taste buds, we reveal what a refractometer (_the optical tool for brix level_) cannot tell, and that is 100% correlated or alined with the capacity of the plant to have tremendous soil-plant interactions, so to say having a good microbiome, good microbial relationships, a capacity to… “make friends”! In other words : “ **No soil intelligence, interaction = no aromatic complexity”** , in principle. So it’s inspired both by a major failure to make progress (deemed due to too much subjectivity) and by recent development in sciences… but to the core it just validates the simple farmers selection : yes it becomes kind of technical with that BRIX-thing but that should ensure some consistance with the pre-selection with at least one objective criteria. And again : having had failures, so to say not measuring progresses in TASTE, the overall taste still remains very good and satisfying : I’ve had many market gardeners satisfied with my 2024 “selection” this year. They were just remarking that it’s more complicated to harvest than a single strain, as cues for maturity are less easy to get : but the overall vigor and earliness was comparable to the best, if not better, for ex the usual “Sugar Baby” variety. I got loads of seeds ultra-diversified if some are interested. --- _[View the full topic](https://goingtoseed.discourse.group/t/watermelon-2026-european-focus-crop/4400)._