Simple Watermelon Tips for your at Home Garden
All about the Seed
When growing watermelons there are many things to consider, so where do you start? There are many watermelon tips out there, so we need to start from the beginning, the seed. With almost all plants, there are two choices, Hybrid or Heirloom. An heirloom seed is one that has not been altered but past down many generations. Most Heirlooms originate from families in the 1800s including some of Hoss tools favorite watermelon varieties such as The other option when choosing a seed is Hybrid varieties, and many people choose these because of there likelihood to produce a higher yield. The cross-pollination of the same plant produces a hybrid seed but different varieties. Hybrids are one of the main contributors to the rise in agricultural output in the last century. Not only do they usually produce a higher yield, but they can also have other benefits such as being sweeter. It all just depends on your style of gardening and what you like to eat. Hoss Tools also offers many Hybrid varieties, including Crimson Sweet, which is an All American variety. The other Hybrids include,Watermelon Tips
After you have selected your seed, the next step is planting, and again we have two options here. You can either direct seed or transplant, and there are benefits to both, but here at Hoss Tools, we recommend transplanting, and here is why. Watermelons take about 85-95 days to mature and starting them off in a seed tray, and then transplanting is going to give you about a two-week head start of everybody. Transplanting can be vital if you are a small scale market farmer because you can get to selling them before everyone else does. Also, for out friends up north that have a smaller growing season, this transplanting method will make sure you have plenty of time to harvest your watermelons. When you see your seeds have started to get nice good leaves on them and are strong enough to pull up the roots, then you know it is time to put them in the garden. When you are planting your transplants into the ground, you want to make sure they are far enough apart to give them plenty of room. Watermelons grow in a vine-like structure, making them spread out on the ground needing plenty of room to grow. Another thing to consider with watermelons is the dense cover they create, making it harder to get water down to the root system. You want to make sure you are watering under the leaves to prevent diseases on the foliage. Deciding to use drip irrigation could take your crop to the next level. One last tip to make sure you are getting the most out of your crop is to make sure you have plenty of pollinators. Lack of pollinators is usually the reason for many problems in people's home gardens if you can't get bees nearby plant you some cut flowers in your garden to draw you some insects to get the flower turning in to fruit. Hopefully, these simple watermelon tips will help take your garden to the next level, check out the video below to find out some more tips!!