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Post by notonari on May 11, 2016 7:14:24 GMT -5
I direct-seeded some of Philip's watermelon crosses last weekend, we've been having summer temperatures for more than a week here so I'm hopeful they will germinate quickly. I'm curious to see how they will do and hope I manage to get a few ripe melons to continue working with. Also sowed some Blenheim Orange, is that the best melon variety for cooler climates atm?
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Post by philip on May 12, 2016 3:04:32 GMT -5
Hello notonari,
are you sure the watermelon seeds came from me?
I can't remember having sent them to anyone, but maybe i did.
As to the Blenheim Orange, it was the best one for me by far last year.
But this doesn't mean that they will be equally good elsewhere because it may just have been a
lucky hybridisation and furthermore the original BO seed i had came from a german gardener who had
selected and improved them for outdoor growing for several years already so chances are the strain is better
than any commercially available Blenheim Orange.
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Post by notonari on May 12, 2016 6:42:25 GMT -5
You sent me (Wim) some watermelon seeds, the Blenheim Orange, and some potato onion seeds last year. At least I think it was you  Anyway, it will be exciting to see the results, though I suspect your growing conditions in Bretagne are slightly better than mine here in southern Sweden. |
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Post by mskrieger on May 12, 2016 9:08:35 GMT -5
Bretagne and southern Sweden. Ah. I am starting to get the picture. You all really do lack heat.
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Post by ferdzy on May 12, 2016 12:58:18 GMT -5
I planted my first melons in pots at the end of April and they are starting to come up. I am narrowing down what I am growing this year to concentrate on a few projects after 3 or 4 years of planting a wide variety of melons and seeing how they did.
The only "regular" melon I am growing this year is Sweet Freckles; I intend to save seed so am growing most of my remaining seed that I got from Holly. These have varied for me but when they have been good they have been fantastic, and when they haven't done that well I think it's mostly been my own fault.
In watermelons, I am growing a patch of my cross between Sweet Siberian and Orangeglo, and a patch of my yellow-when-ripe hybrid. I planted an assortment of seeds from my 6 or 8 earliest, largest watermelons that did not fall into either of the above categories, and they are going to a friend with a market garden to see how they do for him. That's it.
My yellow-when-ripe hybrid so far is the slowest to come; I'm just seeing some emergence today. Everything else is fairly well up.
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Post by glenn10 on May 17, 2016 19:36:49 GMT -5
Congratulations on the good germ rate, glenn10 . But why do you need to plant melons so early? Is there not enough heat during a typical summer to ripen them if you wait? mskrieger, I typically like to get my melons flowering and setting fruit by mid to the end of June. I do this mainly because the daylight is longer and the melons develop more sugar. A melon at the end of July/early August compared to a melon ripening the end of August/September tastes much different in my experience. My eventual goal is to be able to direct seed in rows mulched with the clear poly without the additional poly mini green houses. I don't mind covering rows with poly but moving around these mini green houses is a real pain sometimes. |
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Post by mskrieger on May 18, 2016 9:58:05 GMT -5
Oh now that's worth knowing. I'll have to do some early plantings next year and compare.
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Post by glenn10 on Jul 11, 2016 21:09:15 GMT -5
I thought I would post a few progress photos. So far the season has been really great with lots of nice weather. How has the season been treating everyone else? Updates please!  May 24th just put them in the ground  june 24th in the survival of the fittest row  june 24th  july 11th  jul 11th  july 11th  july11th survival of the fittest row plants are small but with lots of flowers |
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Post by steev on Jul 12, 2016 1:15:41 GMT -5
Clearly you grow where water is not such an issue; congratulations; here in NorCal it is always an issue, especially these past drought years.
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Post by mskrieger on Jul 12, 2016 17:36:08 GMT -5
Looks gorgeous! I am jealous.
I ended up not planting any melons this year, due to not having enough space dug in my new garden (I am waging a slow, multiyear war of attrition against the zoysia grass.) Next year. In the meantime, I'll admire your pictures. Be sure to let us know how everything tastes!
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Post by glenn10 on Jul 24, 2016 13:59:00 GMT -5
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Post by philip on Jul 24, 2016 15:40:40 GMT -5
Well done! They are looking great. Seems like you can start looking forward to a nice harvest.
Things are not great for me this year. I had very bad germination. It was very cold and i probably overwatered. I lost all watermelons (i only had 4) to some animal that ate them. I suspect a rabbit. From hundreds of melon seeds sown i now have 20 plants left that are just starting to flower now. With a bit of luck and some good weather i may still get some melons but it won't be anything like last year.
Best of luck to all of you!
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Post by philip on Aug 16, 2016 15:28:39 GMT -5
I am having some melon fruit starting to grow now at last. After 2 unsuccessful seeding attempts this year i then made a mass sowing of 200 Blenheim Orange seeds. So close to 90 % of my plants this year are "Blenheim Orange". I looked at the different plants and their fruit today and it struck me that i must stop calling them Blenheim Orange because they are all different. This seems to indicate further that last year's Blenheim Orange plant which gave me 15 super good melons was a Lucky cross already because the year before Blenheim Orange was not that outstanding. I then saved seeds of all of the 15 fruit and they are all looking different now and if i understand things the right way, every melon can be pollinated by different male pollen, so the 11 other varieties growing around the BO plant last year must have mixed in all sorts of ways. So this would then be Blenheim Orange open pollinated F2. My landrace is starting to diversify...
4 pictures of Blenheim Orange fruit on different plants
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Post by notonari on Aug 17, 2016 2:31:18 GMT -5
Those are looking good! How big do they get?
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Post by philip on Aug 17, 2016 5:21:40 GMT -5
It dépends, but i'd say about 20 centimeters (8 inches) long and oval shaped usually
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