More Watermelons

[GoDawgs]

All in all, the two vines produces six nice watermelons, the last five of which I pulled yesterday as they were ripe and I wanted to get them out of the sun. Onto the bathroom scale they went. 27, 29, 31, 32 and 33 lbs. Last evening the 29 lb'er went to the new neighbors across the pasture.



This evening I chunked up half of the 27 lb'er for us and cut the other half into quarter slices. Those are in two aluminum pans in the fridge and I'm going to take the pans to former co-workers tomorrow morning. Nice cold melon for breakfast!



These are nice but not the sweetest melons I've had. I think next year I'm going to try the Sangria some of y'all have been raving about along with one Orangeglo from the MMMM swap. That was supposed to be grown in a bucket this year but got caught up in that herbicided compost thing and died.

[Uncle_Feist]

Sangria is the best I've personally come across over the years.

The best watermelons start with variety, then, a healthy, well fed, weed free patch and weather that cooperates for the 2 weeks before, and during ripening. A nice dose of magnesium sulfate about 3 weeks before ripening helps to boost sweetness as well. Those are beautiful melons! @GoDawgs

[GoDawgs]

@Uncle_Feist, thanks for that tidbit about magnesium sulfate. I had scalped any weeds/grass down to the dirt, then laid down cardboard with leaves on top of that. That really helped keep the weeds out.





I think I'm going to remove a strip down the middle and plant some Blue Ribbon bush beans in there. I got a sample in the MMMM and grew them in a bucket last year solely to collect enough for a row. So in they go sometime over the next several days.

[Uncle_Feist]

I am fortunate this year. My melons are clean, the vines are still growing and they are just now beginning to ripen with sunny highs in the 90's forecast for the next 7 days!