Watermelons

[Bird]

I've raised several varieties of watermelons with varying degrees of success, and I've bought and eaten a lot of different ones, but Sunday my wife bought one like nothing I've ever seen. Has anyone tried growing the PureHeart watermelons shown in this site? Very small, almost no seed at all, firm meat all the way through, good taste, and the thinnest rind I've ever seen on a watermelon.

[SteveB]

I've never seen them before, but I was wondering about watermelons today.

Anyone ever consider raising them for money? They go for $10 at the grocery store [img]/forums/images/icons/ooo.gif[/img] They've been very high priced as long as I can remeber. Seems like you could make a good profit on them.

[Bird]

Steve, I don't know where you're located, but watermelons in this part of the country are only $4 to $5 in the grocery store.

[Benson]

I live in Connecticut. I kid you not, I was in the store the other night, they were $9.99. When they go on sale they're like 6 or 7 dollars. What really blows my mind is they do grow watermelons in this state and the price doesn't seem to go down any when they are in season. I've never seen a pick-your-own melon place though. That's why I was thinking there seems to be some money in watermelons, at $10 a shot anyways [img]/forums/images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

[LazyJ_Arabians]

I tried growing a similar variety of seedless red last year and they only got about the size of a softball and apparently they cross-pollinated with my Jubilee and Charleston Greys cause none of them got much bigger than a football. Gotta be carefull with that cross-pollination phenomenon, ever grow a cucumber anywhere near a watermelon? The key to growing melons is sandy loam soil. The right soil and they're the easiest thing there is to produce, any hint of clay and your out of luck.

BTW, cold melon rind on a hot day is the funniest thing you will ever see a horse eat. Hold the rind and let them take turns biting off chunks and you'll almost drown in juice and slobber, then they want to lick you like a popsicle!

[GAFarmer]

My dad and I planted some watermelons in our garden this year. The only problem is that it has been so wet I am afraid they might rot. The other day, a guy my dad works with gave him a melon, and that dang thing must of weighed a ton. I almost fell over when I tried to pick it up! [img]/forums/images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

[Bird]

This sure revived an old thread. [img]/forums/images/icons/laugh.gif[/img] I remember the first time I ever saw a 101 pound watermelon; 1954 if I remember right, in Marlow, OK. It was sitting in front of a supermarket and they wanted the astronomical sum of $3.50 for it. Of course, I couldn't imagine that, since a guy went up and down the residential streets with a mule drawn wagon selling watermelons at two for a quarter. But then I learned that they expected to sell that big one for the seeds.

[Pat]

Bird, Did you ever attend the watermellon festival at Rush Springs. There are lots of different varieties and they are judged on all the imoportant attirbutes: size, texture, taste, sugar, and on and on. Lots of mellons to eat. Was free way back when but a couple years ago half of a large cold mellon was $0.50 which is a fair bargain. This was to eat there standing at a narrow tall raised table where making a juicy mess was the norm. It was outdoors under some shade trees.

When I was in high school I loaded watermellons in the field onto tractor drawn wagons to be loaded into a semi for transport to market. This was wile spending a summer with my aunt and cousins in the sand hills near Enid, Oklalhoma. The farmers said that mellons in the field were hardly worth anything but the handling along the distributioin chain and everyone's profits was responsible for the store price. They let us eat all we wanted. No one bothered with the seeds, just eat the heart and leave the rest behind.

Loading 40 lb mellons in a light rain is tricky buisness. They are slipery when wet and you load them by throwing them to a guy in the trailer.

[img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img] Pat [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

[Bird]

Yep, Pat, I attended the watermelon festival in Rush Springs a couple of years about 50 years ago. I guess they still have it every August. And yes, it was free. They had tables set up in a "U" arrangement with an 18-wheeler backed up to the open end of the "U". Inside that trailer was watermelons and ice. Guys in the trailer would toss watermelons to the guys on the ground who cut the watermelons with machetes; both red and yellow meat melons and you could eat all you wanted free.

There used to be a time when there were some roadside stands in that area where you could stop and eat all you wanted free. The only requirement was that you put the seeds in buckets they had for that purpose, since those places were raising the melons to sell the seeds.

I also remember an article in the local Marlow newspaper warning against stealing watermelons, but also said that if you did steal a melon from the field, to be sure you pulled it off the vine; never take one that was not attached to the vine because some farmers pulled melons off the vine and injected them with poison for the coyotes.

[GAFarmer]

And just think, I ended up throwing that big melon away. I should of sent it to you guys!!!!! [img]/forums/images/icons/grin.gif[/img] [img]/forums/images/icons/wink.gif[/img]