Melon seed for SASE

[americangardener]

Hi all.. I have a problem..

I got too many melon seeds and I'm not gonna be planting em this year. I've had too many problems with cucumber beetles these past two years so i'm trying to limit the number of cucurbits i'm growing this year to a very small amount. Hopefully that'll mean less places for the beetles to lay their eggs for next year.

That means i've got alot of seeds that will just be getting older if no one takes em. Most of these are from trades i made during the past year, and the rest are leftovers from the commercial varieties i grew last season. A few are saved seeds from last season's growouts too.

Ideally i would hope that anyone asking for these will save their seeds and use em for trading or offering to other members here.. but that'd be up to you.

Some quantities are very limited.. so first come, first served.

Here's the list:
Cantaloupe Gold Master
Hearts of Gold
Green flesh honeydew
Hale's Best Jumbo
Rocky Ford

Orange Glow Watermelon
Charleston Grey
Moon and Stars red fleshed
Sugar Baby
Tendersweet Orange
Crimson Sweet

And there's probably a couple dozen other melon varieties mixed in with my other trade seeds that i haven't dug out yet. If anyone is interested PM me for my address. Also let me know which varieties interest you so i can make sure i still have some of em left and reserve em for ya.

Dave

PS.. just edited out all the ones already requested that i will be out of if everyone sends their SASE's. Dosen't leave many varieties... but from these there's only two of the traded for seeds. Those are Cantaloupe Gold Master, and the Moon and Stars watermelon. All the rest i still have pounds of seed leftover from last seasons commercially purchased seed. If anyone wants those.. i'll leave this offer open.

Dave

[raymondo]

Dave, does Santa Claus melon require a long season?

[americangardener]

May 18, 2008 6:13:55 GMT -5 raymondo said:

Dave, does Santa Claus melon require a long season?

Raymondo.. the Santa Claus are already all spoken for.. sorry if you had wanted any. I've had over 20 people respond so far. I know i need to go and edit the list.. I'll take out all the ones i'm out of later.

As for the season.. i really wouldn't know. This would have been the first time for me to grow em.. and i didn't do any research before i got em. I just usually trade for whatever the other person has to offer. The name interested me so i selected em.

[grungy]

Dave,Now that many people have already had a chance and selected I wouldn't mind the following plus any odds and sods you might have left.

Hearts of Gold
Green flesh honeydew
Hale's Best Jumbo
Rocky Ford

Orange Glow Watermelon
Charleston Grey
Sugar Baby
Tendersweet Orange

Please let me know.
Cheers,
Val/grungy

[americangardener]

Val.. yours will be in the mail in the morning.. been working on it already.

I'll put the final few varieties in there.. and send it on it's way to ya.

Hope you get good germination!
Dave

[canadamike]

Ray:

Yes, the Santa Claus is a long season one. By the time your season arrives, I will have an ample supply of cold hardy melons.

I already have many, but I have ordered some ( many in fact) russian ones from the Gaterslaben gene bank. I hope they will make it here in time. And anyway, I will have lots of fresh seeds by september to send your way.

I can organise a selection for your climate, now that I know it! One I have had luck with and is grown in elevation in the mountains of northern california is HAOGEN, and it is pure bliss. I also got 3 from Saskatchewan, the ''New York '' of melons, if they can make it there they can make it anywhere. They produce in zone 2. I will grow and self them as well as hybrisize them ...and 3 more from Manitoba, zone 3, etc...

In the watermelon department, Alan's mass cross of whites has proven to be an early riser, first to pop up after Orangeglo ( one day), along with the one we discussed in PMs, the Sugar Baby special '' selection''


Michel

[juliekru]

Dan,
I am in love with the seeds you sent and they are growing fine! If you have anything you want to get rid of (cough cough) I could take some more off your hands. Let me know so I can SASE you.
Thanks,
Julie

[canadamike]

Raymondo, I am growing lots of melons I got from Gatersleben and I also got 100 or so accessions from Grin-USA, but too late to plant. You already know my inclination for melons from the north, so I'll have LOTS for you. Up to now, I am in for some litle surprises. One would be the very historical MELON DE LUNEVILLE from eastern France, a cross from NOIR DES Carmes and Prescott, WHICH DESPITE A 3 WEEK LATER PLANTING AS GROWN BIGGER than NDC to achieve Prescott size ( am talking about the plants).

This is a horrible summer for cucurbits, no sun, little heat, rain everyday...so it is a great natural selection test..Still coming around here?

[Alan]

It's definetly been a great year to do some natural selection for localized climates on cucurbrits, I would say only about half of what I initially planted has survived this year. A little hard on the pocket book yet but basically a good thing when you stop and think that by selecting and saving these seeds we won't ever have to deal with this kind of pressure in the future. Particularly those varieties that survived our record drought and heat last year and our cool and increadibly wet summer here this year, definetly selecting and creating some locally regionalized and superior seed this year I would say. I've still got a ton of genetic diversity in my mixes and grexes and a lot less of the weak stuff, a definite plus!

[canadamike]

So, you got cold and rainy down there too... are we selecting for aquatic corn? We will end up with ''the rice of the americas'' if it keeps up like that...

On a sad note, your greasy beans are not making it at all here, they are doing better in France, where they were started in pots. I only got 2 sickly plantlets out of the white icycles, I doubt they will make it, but one other, Rocdor, a wax bean, is having a similar fate, albeit in
less dramatic proportions, the others are doing just very fine. The pole I did not plant yet, because of the weather,, I was out of dry soil. There are now frogs in my garden ''ponds'', no kidding.

[grunt]

Julie: you have a PM

[canadamike]

ALAN, THE 2 BEANS ARE MAKING TRUE LEAVES, they are saved. And my melons have gone into high growing gear in the last 3 days. They are flowering at too small a stage, but I can take care of it.

[americangardener]

Now i know who i'm gonna be trading with next season for melon seeds Michel. I didn't plant any melons at all this year cause of the cuke beetles over the last two years. But now i haven't seen any at all this year. Oh well... then for sure they'll be gone next year. I bet the melons would have loved all this rain too.. and maybe that's why i got no beetles yet this year. Maybe they all drowned.

Least my beans are looking good this year.. don't know how i managed to do that right.. but mine are pretty good swimmers. Actually mine are in raised rows.. and they don't even care that it rains every day. So, hopefully, if they keep doing good, i'll have some for trading later on.

Dave

[canadamike]

Dave:

I am all in raised bed or rows too, the rain as been a problem mostly in opening new ground and walking between beds, but the total lack of sun for over a month has taken its toll... Corn needs heat units, some is doing very well but some other is slow and tasseling at midget size. Melons are just picking up after 3 consecutives days of sun, they kind of stayed in limbo for a month. It's a summer for greens and radishes up to now. I am planting lots of radishes today, it will be the first time I do it at thAT DATE, which is usually a no no for them, it is either sooner or later usually... maters are doing real fine in their raised beds, I transplanted 80 more that were due for composting and they are pushing through, I will get a later crop, that's it...

I think we will have to adapt more than we think to climate change...