City, can you post pics of your Orangeglo, inside and out. I got some seed from Rayrose via Muddy and 1/4 of the fruit were light green w/ dark stripes, light yellow/orange flesh, large light grey brown seeds, juicy and tasty, the 3/4 of the fruit were dark green and darker stripes w/ORANGE flesh and the best taste in forever for WM. Both were in the 25-30lb range.
I was guessing on interior color on the rest, some are red too! Iām gobsmacked!
I told Muddy, after she sent you the seeds, that the melons wouldnāt be true.
Iām surprised that you were able to get some decent melons.
Is that what a good Orangeglo is supposed to look like? I harvested about 8 that looked about like that and none were eatable. Only on mine the seeds werenāt dark.
The seeds arenāt really dark, thatās just the lighting. There tan. Thatās a
dead ripe OG. This particular one looks a little dry, but thatās because I
put it in the fridge and forgot to cover it with plastic wrap. You may have
let yours go beyond ripe, as we discussed before. A ripe OG has a good
crunch to it.
I let Chikn know about the high likelihood of cross pollination the day I found out. I was afraid that the melons might all wind up being duds. Thatās why I was so relieved when he wrote to me raving about the quality, especially the taste, of the melons heād harvested.
So far, itās sounding like Chikn wound up with the watermelon version of an unlabeled box of high quality assorted chocolates, with each containing a mysterious and delightful surprise for the senses.
If I remember correctly from last year, itās been a long time since heās been able to harvest an orange melon worth eating from his area. In which case, Iām celebrating the serendipitous success of those crosses. Although the fact that the seeds wound up producing outstanding fruits shouldnāt be too much of a surprise, since you only grow varieties proven to be excellent, Ray, and Chikn is a highly experienced field grower.
Iāve been enjoying this thread, thanks to all the contributors. I assume orangeglo is an OP variety? I must have missed the posts about cross pollination but is that just because you grow so many varieties or is there another reason?
Muddy, youāre missing the point. Whatever success Chikn had was
based purely on luck. Skill had nothing to do with it. Mother Nature
gave him a good box of chocolates.
If he saves the seeds, Iād be curious to find out what heāll get next year.
Nope. Didnāt miss the point at all. I attributed the outcome to the good fortune of seeds that had received a mix of good genes and @Chikn 's ability to give plants what they needed to bring in a harvest.
Thatās a combo of luck and skill.
Yes, itās an OP variety, which means you need to buy new seeds
every year, if you also grew other melons, if you want true OGās .
Advice for next year: try and grow bigger melons on the trellis, Sugar Babies worked great, I harvest like 8 melons from a few vines. In fact it took over the entire trellis, still another 6 or so may ripen in time. Not going to grow the chartenais melons anymore, I havenāt figured out how to harvest one that wasnāt split on the vine.
So did you have to support them or did their own stems support them until they were fully ripe?
And when you say
Will you do anything differently? (Iād like to try this myself.)
simple plastic trellis clips, but tbh, the vines did a better job than the clips ever could, I waited for for the signs of ripeness and cut them away, lost 1 in a wind storm. I have to be careful when walking underneath, whacked myself in the face a few weeks ago
Thanks to all for this discussion of my skills and luck. I have always assumed most of my āskillsā could be attributed to luck. So far Iām saving seed from every wm and will be replanting seed from each. All the seed I received from Muddy looked like the seed in Cityās excellent and highly appreciated pics. I transplanted 8 seed and harvested 10 quality wm. One was identical to Cityās pics. One was very dark green stripes and very deep orange, small black seed, and possibly the best wm Iāve tasted. Several have been red w/small black seed and excellent quality. 3 left, one looks like Cityās and 2 are the dark green stripes. They will get cut soon and Iāll report back. What has surprised me has been the consistent top eating quality of all these wm as I am not a good wm grower living in an area not known for quality wm.
I have known that most of my life. Thanks for ruining my masquerade.
Phil,
Nothing against you nor your skills. Iām sure youāre a very good gardener.
But I know watermelons, and whatever my seeds grew for you all came
from Mother Nature. Sometimes she can be an angel, while other times
she can be the devil. Iām glad that you got some good melons. It sounds like you got a variety of melons from just one group of seeds. You might save the seeds from the different ones that you like, if you still have them, and plant them next year. Iād very curious at what you get.
Ray
That looks very much like a Big Stripe. What variety is it?
Crimson sweet