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Water melonis not particularly difficult to grow, but because they are so demanding I don’t consider watermelons a good plant for beginner gardeners. (You can get lucky if you live in optimum conditions).
Determined the kind of seed you want to plant, since there are many. Decide whether to plant watermelon seeds or transplants. Watermelon seeds need to germinate at a temperature over 70 degrees. If you live in a cool climate, it might make sense to start them indoors a few weeks before the last frost, so you’ll be able get the seedlings underway at the beginning of the growing season.
Otherwise, plan to plant the seeds directly in the ground well after the last frost, when the temperature is holding steady at above 70 degrees.
Watermelon seeds and transplants are available at nurseries in early spring.
Note,Watermelon needs warm soil. Don’t tuck plants into the garden until soil temperature is above 70 degrees F, which typically occurs about the time peonies bloom in northern zones. To be safe, wait until at least 2 weeks pastyour area’s last frost date. Prior to planting, cover soil with black plastic to hasten soil warming. Because watermelons are heavy feeders, prepare your planting bed by adding seaweed, compost, or rotted manure. For best nutrient uptake, the soil pH should be between 6 and 6.8, although the plants will tolerate a pH as low as 5. If you live near a horse farm, another option that works well is to excavate the soil 1 foot deep, add a 9-inch-thick layer of fresh manure, and then cover that with 3 inches of soil mixed with compost. This creates a bed with a high-nitrogen soil base that’s naturally warm. Some gardeners even plant melons in their compost piles to ensure a warm footing and adequate nitrogen.
Use a tiller to work the soil for the beds thoroughly, breaking up large clumps of packed earth. Remove any vegetative matter or deeply incorporate it into the soil.
Now let me say this.
If you like growing things in neat rows, or if you want to plant a large area, grow watermelons on ridges, like the commercial growers do.
Rows should be about 2 m (6 ft) apart and the plants spaced at 30 cm/a foot apart. (Sow twice as many as you want, and keep the stronger ones.)
I prefer growing watermelons in clumps on a mound, in several different locations in the garden. (Mixing things up helps keeping pests and diseases at bay.) If you want several hills together, keep them about 2 m apart.
The mound should be about one metre square and a foot high. Then I plant about ten seeds in it, in three groups of three to four seeds each. The groups are spaced about a foot apart (30 cm).
After a few weeks I can see which watermelon plants grow the strongest, and I snip off the weaker ones, leaving only one seedling in each group. (Don’t pull them up, cut them off. Or you disturb the roots of the others.)
If you have a very small garden but absolutely have to have watermelons, you can try growing them on a trellis. Really.
You need a very strong trellis, you need to train them up the trellis as they aren’t climbers, and you need to support the developing fruit so the trellis holds the weight, not the plant.Water melonplanting needs your time
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