During the past week the cantaloupe have shown they are ready for picking. Quite suddenly their color changes from green to yellow, their stem withers and they exude a strong musk aroma.
I planted the seeds directly into a raised bed (8ft x 4ft) on Sunday 6/26. I had purchased a packet of Burpee’s Ambrosia Hybrid which cost $1.89 (before taxes) and I was disappointed there were only 12 seeds in the packet. I formed two hills in the bed and placed 6 seed in each hill. Previously I had harvested my garlic from the bed and I just added some more compost before planting the cantaloupe seed. I watered well and often with a hose and initially did some light weeding. All seeds became seedlings and, with watering, developed into strong plants. Unlike my struggle with squash, the cantaloupe plants were not visibly visited by any pests.
The melons are well formed and look great. Of course there is usually a snag and it is the taste which is tending to neutral and only slightly sweet. I wonder if that has to do with their nutrition or growing conditions or perhaps I should have planted them earlier in the season, as suggested by the packet. However, the most recently picked are sweeter to the extent we are enjoying them ourselves and not giving them to the chicken. I have decided to save seed from the sweeter melons for next year.
The chicken, both flocks, love the melons which I provide after removing all the seed. Interestingly, only the older birds like bananas.
How many melons have been produced and how are you storing the seeds for next year?
From the dozen seeds I sowed,I have so far harvested about a dozen with perhaps another dozen in the works. The melons since my last post have all been a lot sweater. I think I would have gotten a bigger return by planting out earlier in the season.
I soaked the seeds in water and with my fingers removed the non seed parts of the melon. After drying them on newspaper for a short while in the green house, I have now stored them in a paper envelope in a ziplock plastic bag in the basement where it is dark and cool and relatively dry. I know the recommendation is to use paper envelopes and not zip locks, but my zip locks, which I use for storing all my seed, have worked well for me. They are uniform in size, I write the vegetable name on the bag with a black marker pen and arrange them alphabetically and keepe them in a lidded plastic storage container.