How To Grow Watermelons
We love melons. My favorite melon is a watermelon. We also grow cantaloupe and honeydew melons, and numerous other types
I will start off by talking about my favorite – Watermelons.
Watermelons are so delicious! They do well in hot weather, so it will be a while before you get watermelons. When we plant watermelon seeds, we make a circle in the ground and plant 4 seeds in the large circle. Watermelons actually require a lot of space to grow. About 10 feet is needed for the plant to run.
You can pinch off the curly cues that form a new vine once your plant is well established to encourage growth of melons rather than vines. Also, if you have lots of green fruit at the end of the growing eason, take off the smaller green fruits and only leave the larger fruit that will ripen in time for you to enjoy your melons before it gets too cold.
A fresh watermelon is the most delicious fruit ever in my opinion, especially when it is so hot outside. I can’t get enough watermelon. We grow a variety that you can’t find in the grocery stores, Congas. I think it is the sweetest watermelon there is. However, it does not have a long shelf life. (Hence the reason these can’t make it to your local grocery store.) Also, these melons get much larger than most watermelons, so make sure they are ripe when you pick them.
How To Tell If Watermelons are Ripe
Gently flip the melon over and it should have turned from white, to cream to yellow, then it should be ripe. You can also smell your melon to see if it is ripe. My granddaddy knocks on the melon and can tell if it is ripe from the sound. I actually do grow melons and squash in my raised beds. I just plant 3 plants on the corner of my raised beds. I then train the plant to grow over the side, and they grow over the ground outside of my raised beds.
Make sure that you are always gentle with melons. You don’t want to touch the area between the vine and the fruit unless you are picking it, because it can cause the vine to disconnect from the watermelon leaving you with no fruit.
The variety that we grow is called Conga watermelons. If you have never tried these, I highly recommend them. When you cut the watermelon open, it should be a bright red throughout.Towards the end of the season, I have picked ones that aren’t ripe rather than lose them, and they are still incredibly sweet.
For more gardening tips, click here.
i found this very interesting as i have never been successfull with melons but after reading this i am going to give them another go i will let you no how i fair thank you
I hope that they do well for you! Rene
Rene, When you mention planting in a circle, how big of a circle do you mean. You’ve mention this a few times. Are you making circular raised beds. Could I use tires to grow watermelons? Jan
We actually use square and rectangular raised beds, as well as planting in the ground. Now that I re-read this post, I can see why that could be confusing. We have grown potatoes in tires, but never watermelons. I think that you could probably grow 2 or 3 watermelon plants in a tire as long as you make sure to train them to grow out from the tire. When we grow the watermelon on the ground, we make a 24 inch circle, and place 4 seeds equally apart. When you plant them in a circle, we are able to grow more plants in less space. We separate the circles by 10 feet. When I plant them on the edge of the square of the raised garde, I plant them in a triangle. One seed is a couple of inches from the corner, and then 2 seeds about 18-24 inches away to form a triangle. Hope that helps! Rene
Great a person webpage proprietor triumph blog site submit wonderful sharings in such a blog usually have enjoyable
Hello admin beneficial submit very much thanks adored this blog seriously significantly
I used to be looking for this wonderful sharing admin significantly thanks and also have nice blogging bye
Nice one webpage owner achievement weblog article wonderful sharings within this blog site at all times have exciting
i cant get how it is possible to reveal like this incredible posts admin considerably thanks
I like this weblog it’s a master piece! Glad I noticed this on google.