Watermelon Projects Update for the Year

Hey, it's the moment I've been waiting for, and you all get to hear about it. Lucky you! It's time to asses our watermelon breeding projects. So how did things go?

To sum up, the phrase of the year is "Thinning the herd." Yeah. Like that.

On the other hand, if we think we are breeding watermelons for lousy Canadian summers I guess we have to have some lousy Canadian summers in order to test how things are going. And in spite of my griping, I do feel like we continue to make some good progress.

In the picture above, you can see some melons from our golden-when-ripe project. From the picture you would get the impression we got a good number of melons, none very large and few yellow when ripe. That would be accurate.

On the bright side, the first 2 melons to ripen did turn yellow when ripe, and they achieved a very decent size. They are at least half siblings if not siblings (most of our melons are still within the range of second cousins once removed, if not more closely related, but at this point I'm mostly not keeping track).

Melon GR001-0904 came in at 1.181 kg, and melon GR002-0906 weighed .846 kg. I regret to say that melon GR002-0906 tasted a bit better and was a bit less seedy. However they both compare favourably to last year's GR001-0825, which was the largest of the year and weighed .82 kg.

The interior of GR001-0904. We seemed to have some problems with incomplete fertilization but there are enough seeds to go on with.

Last year was a much better year for growing watermelons so I am very happy about the increased size I am seeing in these 2 melons as well as in general this year. Both of these will supply seeds for next year.

We planted a few plants of the original Golden Midget. We only got 3 Golden Midget fruits, of which 2 are seen above in the back row. The third one rotted on the plant and would have been smaller than either of the two I picked. Note the weights: at approximately half a pound each they are very unimpressive. Even our also-rans are coming in larger than that, for the most part.

I don't seem to have that melon at .405 kg recorded. I guess it wasn't great and I didn't bother to keep seeds or number it. The little green one is GR004-0923. Not very big and not golden rinded, but one of only a few melons to score an 8 out of 10 for flavour. I might plant a few seeds from it next year. I don't want tiny melons, but if we are going to have them, I want ones that taste good. But I still have to think about it. There were 3 other larger melons that scored an 8 too and would perhaps be better candidates.

This is GR006-0926. It did not turn yellow when ripe, although the rind is naturally fairly yellow. At 2.05 kg this was our second-largest melon from this project and the only large melon to score an 8 out of 10 for flavour. It's in, for sure.

Seeds were a little on the pale side, as was the flesh, but not awful, and the rind was nice and thin.

The next melon of interest was GR010-1002. Again, it didn't turn yellow when ripe, but size was within the desired range.

The seeds were paler than I like and so was the flesh, the rind was not as thin as some, but okay. Flavour scored an 8 though - one of the best, so it is probably in next year too.

This was in some ways the most interesting melon of the year. GR011-1003 came up as a volunteer in what became a strawberry bed this year. It was our only volunteer melon this year and it got started a fair bit later than any of the ones we planted out. As soon as I saw the first female flower I started basting it with pollen from the set of plants that produced GR001-0904 and GR002-0906. Although this one did not turn yellow when ripe, it carries the gene, so I have very high hopes that it will have yellow offspring since it is crossed with yellow ripening melons. 

In spite of its late start it became our largest melon of this project for the year. We will be planting lots of seeds from this one. 

Alas, it only scored a 6 for flavour. I'm hoping that it had potential for better flavour, but was cut a little short by the vine dying before it was completely ripe. The texture was excellent, the rind was nice and thin, and the small black seeds were plentiful but not ridiculously so. 

Overall, my hope is that next  year we will get enough large, sweet and tasty, yellow when ripe melons to stop planting ones that turn out to have green rinds. We are definitely getting closer to having the size/colour/flavour we want in individual melons, but for this year we are still in the stage where we have to accept melons that have 2 out of 3 of those characteristics. Progress is definitely happening though!

Our other project, crossing Orangeglo with Sweet Siberian for a larger, tastier, orange fleshed melons did not apparently go so well, but I am reasonably pleased nevertheless. 

We only got 4 melons ranging from 2.148 kg to 3.745 kg, which is what I would consider our target size. There are a few other melons at smaller sizes under consideration, but these 4 form the core of what we will be moving forward with. PJ003-0922, shown above, was our second largest of this group and shows a typical shape. They varied from green netted to having various stripes. I prefer the striped rind, but we are not yet to the stage of fussing about that by any means.

PJ001-0916 started off the project looking hopeful. It grew down at the end of the bed where we had left some lettuce to go to seed as well as planting our squash, and it was the only melon produced down there as the watermelon vines got rather smothered. The colour is not exactly what we wanted, but reasonably close. It got very badly fertilized and there are hardly any viable seeds, (but a few) and it did not come out mis-shapen which often happens with incomplete fertilization, so that's good. Again, rind is somewhat annoyingly thick. Scored a solid 7.5 for flavour and we noted it as "very sweet". Size was an acceptable 2.362 kg.

PJ002-0921 was a bit dismaying to open. Seed colour is good, but the flesh is way paler than we want. Flavour was an acceptable but not thrilling 7 out of 10. The seeds were small and the rind was not too thick, although it's hard to tell because it blended in with the flesh so much. At 2.148 kg it was one of the smaller of the big-enough melons. We may decide not to replant from this one.

Well so much for orange flesh. This is PJ003-0922. I might have thought that it picked up some pollen from the other watermelon project given the red flesh, but the size, the shape, the rind pattern and the seed colour all suggest that no, this is the offpring of Orangeglow and Sweet Siberian. Watermelon flesh colour genes are numerous and their interactions are complex. We are not throwing this one out of the project yet, even though it is not the colour we are looking for. For one thing, it was the only one of this group to score an 8 for flavour. At 2.783 kg it was also our second largest melon of this set.

Like most of the melons from this group this year, the rind is sturdy (good) but thicker than I like. Again though, I don't think we are at the stage of worrying about that particularly.

PJ006-0930 came the closest of the large melons to having the colour we want. At 3.745 kg it is also notably the largest melon of this group. Flavour was a just barely acceptable 6 though, and the texture was okay but not great. Still, I think it will get planted next year just for the colour and size.

I broke these 2 runts open in the garden expecting to discard them but curious about them. Imagine my annoyance to discover that they were the orange colour we are looking for. I gave the larger of the two a taste, and it was surprisingly good although I didn't formally rate it. Since one of the problems with Orangeglo is that smaller specimens fail to develop good flavour, I saved seeds from it. The tasty-when-small characteristic is one we definitely want to have. It is now known as PJ005-0928 and its seeds will likely go into the ground next spring. It weighed in at a laughable .645 kg.

There are a few melons from the orange fleshed project still to open and assess. None are as small as PJ005-0928 and if I find one or two that I think just as well flavoured and with the same orange flesh, it may get bumped by them. But in general, we have our candidates. I'd say most of the qualities we are looking for in this project are here, they are just not combined into one melon. Still, we'll stir them  up and plant them out, and hope for better luck next year.

Posted in: Ontario Food