My Favorite Gardening Fruit Melon Tips: How to Grow a Good watermelon or cantaloupe

A good watermelon or cantaloupe needs a smooth start in warm, well-drained soil, a steady water supply especially when the melons get big, and plenty of heat at ripening time.

Anything northern gardeners can do to trap extra heat for their plants will help them grow bigger, better melons. In the warm states, a steady supply of water is most important.

Melons like well-drained soil and lots of water. It’s not a contradiction. They like to “keep their feet dry” but still get regular drinks of water. Go out to the farmstand with the biggest and sweetest melons and you’ll probably discover the melons are growing in well-drained sandy soil. If your soil is heavy clay and does not drain too well, you’ll get better melons on raised beds.

Pushing melons for the earliest and sweetest

Gardeners everywhere want melons to ripen earlier and to taste sweeter. This is understandable in the North where the season can sometimes be too short for many melon varieties.

It’s also true in the South, where the season is long and hot and where you’d think there would be no difficulty in growing superior melons. But it’s important to give melons an early start in the South so you can harvest them before the very hot, dry spells of summer. Drought is very harmful, because good melons must have water as they get big and start to ripen. It pays to push your crop so the melons will mature when the chances of getting a few good rains are good.

If you’re interested in trying to get those cantaloupes, watermelons, and honeydew melons to ripen earlier, try these tips:

• Sprout your seeds a few days before you plant, or start seedlings indoors 3 or 4 weeks before planting time.
• Plant outside 2 or 3 weeks earlier than usual. Use hotcaps or plastic grow tunnels (along with a few radish seeds for insect control) in case the weather turns cool.
• When there are plenty of melons on the vines, pick off the fuzzy ends to concentrate the plants‘ energy into producing flowers and fruit, not more vines.

Smell those cantaloupes…

My favorite way to tell when a cantaloupe is ripe is to smell it. When it gives off a strong “musky” or perfume-like scent around the stem end, it’s ripe. This technique works in the supermarket, too. Don’t squeeze, tap, rap, or punch the cantaloupes. . .smell ‘em.

Some varieties will indicate ripeness when the skin changes from green to yellow or tan and the netting becomes very pronounced.

Also, when a melon is ripe its stem will usually separate or slip from the melon with very little pressure.

Thump those watermelons…

Judging when a watermelon is ripe is a guessing game.

One way is to “thump” the melons. I wasn’t sure about this technique when I first tried it a few years ago, but it works.

A watermelon that still has a way to go will make a sharp thump when you rap it, like rapping on your forehead.

A melon that is ripe will sound a little muffled. This is like rapping on your chest.

An overripe melon will be heavier and more muffled than a ripe one, like the sound from rapping your stomach.

If you think you have a good ear for sound, and are willing to give yourself a few hard knocks, this ripeness test might be fun.

Another sign of ripeness is the color of the spot where the watermelon rests on the ground or tin can. As the melon ripens, that ground spot turns from white to a deep, creamy yellow, then towards orange, when it’s ripe. The shiny surface of some varieties will dull somewhat when ripe.

Watch the watermelon stem to judge ripeness, too. There is a small tendril next to the point where the stem of the melon comes out of the vine. When this tendril turns brown and dries up like a pig’s curly tail, the melon is ripe.

I’ve noticed that animals, birds, and bees like cantaloupes and watermelons. If you spot a pencil- thick hole in a cantaloupe, be careful . . . might be a few yellow jackets inside.

My advice on varieties

• Watermelons—Ifyou have a short growing season, look for fast-maturing varieties. Try some of the smaller icebox watermelons such as Sugar Baby which ripen in 75 to 85 days. We chill them, cut them in half, hollow out the centers a bit, and put in ice cream—now that’s a nice dessert.

Dixie Queen and Charleston Gray are two of the most popular standard watermelons. They do well in warmer climates, but I’ve grown them successfully here in Vermont, too. Just ask my grandsons how they tasted!

• Cantaloupes—I like the hybrid varieties of cantaloupes. I have a short growing season and want the best chance of success. My favorite hybrids are Gold Star, Bur- pee Hybrid, and Harper Hybrid.

Lift your melons for extra heat

• Save large cans such as coffee cans. When the melons are the size of baseballs, place the tin cans near them. The open ends should be facing downward, and the cans should be buried deep enough so they won’t tip over.
• Gently lift each melon onto a can. Melons like heat and as the first sunlight of the day hits those cans, the melons will get warm earlier than usual. It’s like making the day longer. In northern gardens, this helps melons ripen faster.

In warm climates, this step is not necessary, There is usually enough heat to ripen melons. The water supply is more critical. When the weather is hot, they need 1 or 2 inches of water a week.

If you spray paint the cans black, they’ll absorb more heat. Also, they won’t rust out, so they can be used another year.

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