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Winter watermellons. Can it work?

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Yes it can indeed!
I planted some Mellon seeds in late July from a mellon that a co-worker brought to work for all of us to eat. The mother plant’s mellon was SO sweet and tasty! I gathered a few seeds from it and planted them in an area that was prepared with about 2 lbs of worm castings worked into the loose native soil. The little seeds started out looking like this:

The mulch is native shredded tree trimmings about 1 inch thick and the seeds had no problem poking up through it.
The above photo was taken 2 weeks after planting the seeds.
So, what does the mellon patch look like after 2 months?

It has gone crazy in the rich organic soil and has produced two pretty good mellons and survived the first frost of the winter! I did cover it with a blanket that cold night and it’s already produced 8 new “babies” on the way that range from 2 inches to 5 inches in size.

Will it survive the rest of the winter and still produce?
I do not know. The plant HAS been grown in rich organic biologically active soil so that automatically gives it a 5 deg. advantage for survival below 32 deg. The addition of a blanket during freeze conditions gives it another 3 deg, so in theory, it should be good down to 24 deg for a short period of time. We’ll see what happens!
N2O

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Well done N2o....keep us posted...:>)

21 Nov, 2011

 

I just hope that the larger mellon will grow to maturity so I can harvest some seeds for next fall! ;-)
~N2O~

22 Nov, 2011

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