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Post by canadamike on Dec 21, 2008 3:09:09 GMT -5
Iam undergoing the melon selection/research phase for next summer. So far, I have not had time to go through Gatersleben's melons, but Grin-USA is done. Once the german bank is covered, next phase is building a database accessible according to various criterias. Unfortunately, Gatersleben offer no descriptors, unless someone here can show me how to access them. Nothing is perfect. I want to build a complete database, pictorials included. One thing is sure. I won't accept to have ANY PRECONCEPTIONS, about the ability of ANY melon to perform in the north. I already have had enough surprises in this field to let the plants play the game by themselves. Of course, I am aiming for short to midseason melons, some late will be tried, but short of DTM, selection everything will be tried. Old time Tennessee did relatively well here this summer, giving me 2 large melons. Not good to eat, they did not ripen, but a year like 2008 was throwing everything at the fruits, and some melons from Spain and Israel, hardly cold areas, gave me good results. All of you , even those in California, can have some . I might select for the north, but I have accessions that could do wonders under all american climates. Some accesssions from China also have lots of multiple disease resistance. And one from India has the ability to ripen in the rain season... I much prefer true cantaloupes and non musky melons. They taste more like the green fleshed ones. I have a huge assortment of early ones that fit the bill ( 70 days or less ) and I mean huge... there are also winter keepers in the lot, one from Russia is funnily called PIGMY KASSABA.. Those who want to step in are welcomed, you do not have to try hundreds like me, any help counts. I expect reports on plant characteristics, health, production and pictures. Seed saving too, of course. Nothing hard to do, we already do most of it anyway. The pictures are useful and will also interest people in the forum this summer, so the very tired and busy people trying to keep it alive will have less work
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Post by canadamike on Dec 22, 2008 1:21:57 GMT -5
Phase one of the selection process is now over. I now will have to count them and select according to priority. It won't be easy, as a lot are early ( 70 days or less). I suspect a lot of white fleshed ones ( the majority of asians) will have to go.
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Post by Alan on Dec 22, 2008 16:03:37 GMT -5
Keep up the good work Mike and keep us updated. We really need to come up with a form that we can use for evaluating crops across the board, perhaps a downloadable one so that anyone working on breeding and trialing programs can fill the out, maybe even digitally, for record keeping purposes.
Anyhow, I agree that the Gatersleben system could use quite a bit of modification, particularly in regards to search functions and discriptors which do make the site hard to navigate and to access seed from. I wrote to them about this today, hopefully we will see some changes.
You do have to give them this though, they are much better organized than GRIN.
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Post by canadamike on Dec 22, 2008 16:58:12 GMT -5
Alan, apart from the descriptors missing, Gatersleben are great, but Grin has been as great to me, I cannot complain of anything. I have found them very organized and delivering a much higher percentage of the listed seeds. 30 to 40% of what I ask in Germany is not available despite being listed as such. Honestly, when everything is taken into account, descriptors, and percentage of asked for seeds, studies on diseases and all, nothing in the world beats GRIN my friend, nothing. It might be, though, that there are some preconceived ideas rooming around Grin than when an order is international, it is more serious, nobody being a prophet in his own country... Canada and the USA have adopted jointly the same computer system and platform, but Canada has nothing to offer in the descriptors area. It is nice to see an american who does not think that America is always better but let's be frank, many times they are
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Post by canadamike on Dec 22, 2008 23:38:18 GMT -5
The count for the first selection of melons to grow and evaluate this year is 373 cultivars. Unless I get help, I will have to concentrate on less. I am lucky to have some friends here to help. I was planning on going up to 300 here, but it is a bit of a stretch given my resources and the fact there is much evaluation and growing work to do in many other fields, apart from the regular production of veggies for market...
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Post by raymondo on Jan 2, 2009 5:15:01 GMT -5
I'm a melon lover too Michel. I only have a small collection (38 varieties). This year in the garden I have only three - Fordhook Gem, Green Machine and Zatta. Unfortunately, all were planted rather late but it has been ideal melon weather just lately so I'm hopeful that I'll get plenty of ripe ones before frost. It's always touch and go here though. Last year, for example, I got no melons at all!
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Post by tania on Jan 25, 2009 22:47:11 GMT -5
Mike, I can help with melon evaluations this year by 'adopting' 2-3 different varieties that I have not grown yet. If they ripen in our PNW climate, I should be able to collect seeds, as I hand pollinate and grow them in isolation cages. Every year I am able to grow and properly isolate 5 different types of melons, but I already have a few of my own to plant for fresh seed stock. Of course my growout results will be posted at TOMATObase . (Btw, are are welcome to use TOMATObase to post your growout results, if you want) So please let me know if I can be useful for your project. Regards, Tatiana
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Post by pugs on Jan 26, 2009 0:21:58 GMT -5
Michel,
Is "Sweet April", 9200017, one of the ones you are requesting from GRIN? I thought it sounded interesting.
Pugs
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Post by Alan on Jan 26, 2009 14:43:51 GMT -5
I will be growing out a number of Mike's Lines and some other lines that I requested from GRIN, Gatersleben, and other traders this year, should be lots of interesting diversity to play with!
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Post by canadamike on Jan 26, 2009 17:21:33 GMT -5
Tatiana, thanks for the help. Please pm me to tell me the ones you're growing. Would melons from the mountains of Asia be good for you or are you in a wetter climate...I do have an accession from India that can ripen the melons in the rain season, I'd love to see this one trialed where there is ( usually....) more rain in summer than here. Flavor is said to be quite ordinary, but nothing says it would not be better with more sun.
Melons require direct sun, ''no rain'' is not enough for flavor if OK for seed production. But this gene could prove precious in breeding.
Pugs, nope, it is not in my list, but I will look it up. This project is far from over and more will be added.
Raymondo, do you have melons we might not know in your list?
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Post by canadamike on Jan 26, 2009 17:23:31 GMT -5
Alan, what are the ones you got? I won,t send them to you. I have to find time to write the list, the rest of the work is done. Tatiana, I will look into your databae as a start, thank you.
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Post by pugs on Jan 26, 2009 22:50:16 GMT -5
I've looked at requesting seeds from GRIN, but they ask for my organization and I don't have one. Does anyone know if they will let some out anyway?
Thanks,
Pugs
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Post by Hristo on Jan 29, 2009 15:16:18 GMT -5
Checked Gatersleben's melons and saw not so few duplicated names (different translations). Also considering that many accessions are nameless I would expect many duplicated varieties. Gatersleben has very very few varieties from Central Asia (some are listed as from USSR and Russia). Only 1 from Turkmenistan!!! Maybe this is the only one country that (since 1994) has national melon holiday (on 13 or 14 august). From Uzbekistan only about 10 (see www.bioversityinternational.org/publications/pdf/1135.pdf )! In former USSR melons from Uzbekistan have been most famous. Kazakhstan, Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq etc. - same story. I know from people that have been in some of these countries that there are some superb tasting melons. So P. S. I hope you understood my English
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Post by canadamike on Jan 29, 2009 16:12:03 GMT -5
A majority of the 500 we are trialing this summer are from that area Hristo...
Don't cry my son, daddy has melon seeds for you if you want some ;D
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Post by raymondo on Jan 29, 2009 17:19:20 GMT -5
Michel, unlikely that I'd have melons unknown to you guys. Most come from US sources like Baker Creek. Only one is local, Southern Sweet, which was selected by a local seed company for cooler summer areas (south for us means cooler of course), though they don't say what the parent variety was. I haven't grown it.
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