Melons for 2009

[PatrickW]

Hi OG,

I'm no melon expert, but for the sake of trying to give you an answer to your question, melons are very difficult outdoors at northern latitudes. At the very least you should have variety intended for the north, and so I think your chances of success with Piel de Sapo are pretty small. Northern grown melons usually do better in a greenhouse or coldframe, I think.

Melons like a long and hot season, and hate being transplanted into cold soil. They also don't like chilly evenings. I think most people attempting melons in the north do it on fresh horse manure, in order to provide food and heat to the melons. Søren (In the Toads Garden blog) did some posts about this last summer, and are worth having a look at.

[ottawagardener]

Extreme Gardener said that Piel de Sapo worked well for her. I was going to try with plastic mulch just as I grow sweet potatoes and I have faith that if CanadaMike can do it (do you use a greenhouse Mike?) then it might work? I'll hop on over to Toad's Garden to see what he wrote. Thanks!

[canadamike]

Ottawa, there is a huge difference between our summers and theirs. Although warmer as a whole from a yearly standpoint, the weather in the summer in the continental northern part of Europe sees colder and more humid nights than we do AND a lot of grey skies. Melons need sun.

My 2008 harvest of 100 plants, all protected by black plastic so rain did not play a direct role per say in their growth was terrible. Apart from rain and the diseases coming with it, the summer was also GREY. With plastic, it would have been a killer season had we had sun in between rainy periods. But as you know, the skies were almost always grey and when we had some minimal sun it was often in the end of the afternoon or in the evenings.

Cloud cover plays a role for sun loving crops The sun heaths up the molecules of the plants when it hits them. Helps a lot...

[ottawagardener]

I figured so and I have always been curious about how short season crops work in low sun areas and vica versa. I guess sometimes it's about trial and error. Like I'm very impressed by Resbie's yield of Red Sweet Corn (name escapes me) and figured if it does well in the ol' blightey (I lived in Nottingham for nearly 5 years and think developed vit. D deficiency ;-) then it might do quite well here as we get sig. more sun input. However, who knows? Gotta try it for a couple years, I say.

[orflo]

I tried a whole lot of different melons outside: I can say they don't work, with some noticeable exceptions: de Bellegarde and minnesota midget. De Bellegarde is the best of the two, because it has got a very big resistance to the stem rot near the foot of the plant, that's the big problem over here: the feet get too wet and they can't dry up (indeed, lack of sun), resulting in dead plants. Even de Bellegarde doesn't produce much over here: in the greenhouse, I can expect 10 melons each plant, outside 3,4 maybe, grown on horse manure hills...

[canadamike]

each plant or each hill Frank? Cause 3-4 per each plant of a good sized melon is good here too. Maybe we just complain less

[PatrickW]

I think the main thing that sets the climate in Holland and Belgium apart from Ontario is we are on the west coast, and you are closer to the east. Our weather is very Pacific Northwest like, and similar to British Columbia or the US west coast. It's very mild and wet. We do sometimes get fantastic dry and sunny summers, especially now with the changing climate.

The night time isn't always humid here. I have memories growing up in Chicago, on the lake, of overwhelmingly humid nights. We rarely get anything like that here. I would guess if you live near a body of water, your nights are probably as humid as ours. What sometimes happens is a weather front moves in making it very humid for a few days, but then passes.

This past summer was particularly miserable, but for some reason not as bad for me as in surrounding areas. We do get lots of micro-climates sometimes, and that seems to be what happened a lot this year. While Frank and I only live a few hours apart in the car, our garden climates and soil can be very different. It's the same with Søren in Denmark, we are an easy day's drive of each other, but our climates are really pretty different. When I think about climates a day's drive away from Chicago, it's nothing like the differences we can see here.

What makes my garden wet is more being below sea level than the weather, but of course the weather is an important factor too. One obvious problem I had with my melons was the wind, and I doubt Frank gets as much wind as I do. While Frank was having problems with stem rot, I may not have that problem because my soil is much looser and better draining than his. I don't remember Søren mentioning anything about stem rot.

In any case, the climate here is a little more complex than Michael made it seem, and there are a lot of variables to take into account.

[canadamike]

Soren and I just spent some time going over climate charts for breeding purposes. You're right Stevil, the story is more complex than my little résumé, but you have longer days, colder nights and a wetter climate. Of course hardiness zones are totally innefficient at helping us here, they are more of a winter lenght measure than anything else, but it seems that cold resistance, and rain and ''grey skies'' tolerance( a new HG measure tool? ) are in order here.

Of course, in your case, micro climates are also very important...

[bluelacedredhead]

OG, the race to get melons to mature in this area can be difficult. But something I read on the Fedco seed site two years ago made a world of difference here on the farm.
Unlike seed packets that tell you to plant 3 or 4 seeds per hill, then thin if you will, Fedco recommends that northern growers only put one plant per hill. It means less competition for the roots, and therefore, the plant grows faster, and produces fruit with greater speed.

Oh, and of course, trellising for more sun and heat works too.

I logged on to check this thread for info on Piel de Sapo types, so your post caught my eye.

Which brings me to ask Michel me if any of the melons on his list are Christmas melon types??

[lavandulagirl]

Michel - I'd love to have some of the ones you felt were too long-seasoned for you. (Whatever varieties you felt were worth another try... none of the nominally tasteless stuff!) If I do well with them, I can send seed back to you from the plants that mature the most quickly. Let me know if you've got anything left, and I'll send postage.

[canadamike]

Yes there are. I grew a couple, but one attracted my attention so much that I will grow many of it next year for personnal consumption, it is MARYGOLD, sold by BOUNTIFUL GARDENS of California. I had a couple of others, but results were abysmal for me.

I'll have others. Thanks Lav and Blue and all the others for showing interest, yes Lav I'll have plenty of melons for you and others, I am just waiting to et them. There is usually a considerable discrepency between what is ordered and received, so I'll know much more in January or so... I already have much, but I would like to build a database I can play with. With the numbers of cultivars I am playing with, most numbered or with names I can barely read, it has become critical.

A lot of these melons are geneticly closer to the ancient melon families that gave us today's classification ( inodorus, cantaloupensis etc...) The oval form of Lunéville, for exemple, resemble some of these melons.

Let's just say there was a time they were looking quite different. From these forms our modern groups evolved. They often come from areas where societies are a bit like the melons...

[bunkie]

michel, in your travels on the net, have you ever seen or heard of this melon, it's Oranje Ananas? i'm looking for some seed. it looks like avery interesting one....

[canadamike]

I do not know this one. I looked it up, it is not in the genebanks I can access. So I ggogled it and found the same picture you posted here, along with the comments....

Have you read them? Not much to entice me to grow it...

There are lots of melons looking like that in genebanks. The spotted look gene is dominant over the green ribbed gene. Oval is dominant over round.

It has some similarity with Lunéville, which is extremely disease and cold resistant, while the comments of the people who grew Oranje ananas say quite the contrary about it.

I am not sure I would work hard at getting it...

But I can send you seeds of Lunéville....

[bunkie]

and see michel, this is why i asked you cause i knew you'd have info!!!

right about the comments that they were not suited for a Dutch climate and the troubles they had with bugs, etc... but i was fascinated by the skin. i've never seen anything like that before. i'm still an amateur gardener even after all these years!

and yes, i'm soooo looking foward to the Lunaville seeds! ;D

[canadamike]

I am an amateur gardener too, Bunkie. The fact I just started to sell veggies does not change that at all, nor the incredible chance I have to finally have acreage to play with.

I am sticking to that amateur gardener title with MUCH MORE pride than professional grower

When one sees what the so called professional tend to grow...

There is much much much ( enough much? )more knowledge of the soil, it's living organisms, bio-diversity and growing techniques amongst the ''amateurs'' here than in the so called ''true agricultural'' field anyway.

The amount of knowledge I have of these things, like in your case and in the case of most here by far, far exceeds the amount of knowledge of the ''professionals'' who are good to know you need your strawberries in the third week of June to make a fast buck, and that you sell more green than yellow beans at the market and all sorts of commercial details, but that is my point, they are professionals in commerce.

The number of them this amateur has given gardening tips too....

They basically are a somewhat thinking commercial extension of the machines they use in the field, when they are not simply the receiving end of the government's agronomists advice.

As for the organic ones, everybody knows they are only amateurs...
according to the ''real'' ones.

I'll jump in your train, Bunkie, being proud to be forever one of your amateur friends...

P.S. There are seeds for you of course, but let's wait untill I get all my other seeds too, if you don't mind... there will be more to share.

Michel