Hi friends, I wanted to dedicate a post to growing watermelons! I’ve shared (and/or vented) about growing watermelons on the blog (you can check out my July Garden Update here) and also on my Instagram account.
Please note that this is our first time growing watermelons… and let me tell you – it’s been a roller coaster!
For the longest time, we didn’t see any fruit!
Growing watermelons from the beginning...
Everything started off strong. In fact, the seedlings sprouted super quick! We planted about 12 seeds at the beginning of May 2020 and saw sprouts within days.
We transferred the 6 strongest seedlings...
I wanted to do a little test between growing in the ground versus the Square Foot Garden.
According to the SFG book, you can grow watermelon in the boxes! The only caveat is that you need to dedicate TWO plots per one plant – so that is what I did.
We had 5 in the ground and one in the bed. I actually stuck the strongest looking seedling in the bed (playing favorites, perhaps).
Growing watermelons in the ground is superior to the Square Foot Garden Beds...
Ironically, the watermelons in the ground surpassed the one watermelon in the Square Foot Garden bed. The one in the bed got bigger, but the ones in the ground grew faster and significantly larger. Again, please note that everything was started on the same day.
The watermelons grew like crazy!
It was basically a bunch of massive vines (around 12 feet long!) of really green leaves. We started to see a few yellow flowers here and there… but for about 4 weeks, that’s the most action we saw.
The plants kept growing and looked really green, but it was getting a little frustrating because they were taking up so much space.
They were a pain to move each time we wanted to mow the grass and my husband begged me to give up and just pull them out.
To be honest, they weren’t even pretty to look at… I always nicknamed it the green octopus.
First sighting of watermelon fruit!
But fast forward a couple more weeks and we started to see the glimmer of hope we were waiting for!
At the beginning of August, which was about 90 days since they were planted, we could see a little, fuzzy, green, cucumber-looking fruit!! It was so cool.
I want to call out that the Watermelon variety I have is Allsweet.
The seed package quotes “95 days until harvest” but as mentioned above, at day 90 we were not anywhere close to harvesting.
After we saw the first one, about 10 more “potential” melons started to pop up.
The fruits grew at an incredible rate! I would guess they grew 1-2 inches a day!
So after a week, you could see a massive change in size.
We got to a point where we had 7 good sized watermelons!
Today, at the beginning of September, we have about 4 strong watermelons that look like they’re going to make it all the way – which is super exciting.
We technically have 5 watermelons, but one has sadly split…
It took us about 120 days from seed to where we are today & they still are not 100% ready...
You know your watermelon is ready to harvest when the tiny tendril turns from all-green to all-brown.
Another way to be sure your melon is ready is to look at the spot where the watermelon sits on the ground. When ready, the spot will turn from white to yellow.
NEWBIE TIPS FOR GROWING WATERMELON
- Water often… I watered deep about once a day (early in the morning) but if it rains on the same day, that’s okay! You want to aim for about 1 gallon each week, per plant. It’s also wise to water at the base, not the leaves.
- Dedicate enough space… Plant in a place where they have a lot of room to grow and where they will see full sun. I tried growing the strongest seedling in the Square Foot Garden bed and it flopped quickly. The ground is a much better place to grow melons. If planting multiple watermelon plants, you want to space about 5’ apart (which sounds crazy, but they need the space).
- Be patient… as mentioned above, my watermelons did not produce fruit as quickly as I thought they would have. The seedlings did sprout quickly, which was fun for my kiddos to see… but we had a long waiting period. If I could go back in time, I would have fertilized the plants… maybe that would have moved things along faster.
- Let them be… Once they reach a size where you can see the baby melon growing (about an inch or so) don’t touch them!
I’d love to hear about your experience growing watermelons!
Please share your secrets and favorite varieties in the comments below. I’d also be interested in learning about watermelon fertilizer tips and tricks.
Take care and happy gardening!
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