Oh so sweet! I harvested my Sugar Baby watermelons, and they are delicious. Sorry I only put in one plant this year. Next year, 2 - 3 plants will find their way into the garden. They're the perfect size to place in the fridge and just enough to share. Last year I picked them too soon. I learned to check the bottom to determine if they're ripe. If the bottom has a cream/yellowish spot, they're ready to harvest.
My garden is coming to a close. I pulled the green beans, cucumbers and squash plants. I still have lots of tomatoes that need to ripen. My peppers didn't do well this year. I'll manage to harvest enough to place in the freezer for chili and salsa, but no pickled peppers this season.
My lessons learned:
1) Read the labels. I planted bush beans instead of pole beans around my tee pee trellis. In spite of that mistake, they produced well and I was able to harvest several gallons for the freezer.
2) Build a bigger trellis for my squash and zucchini plants.
3) Plant garlic in the fall. My attempt at growing during the spring was a total failure. I didn't harvest 1 garlic bulb.
4) Don't start my seeds indoors too early. I lost quite a few plants because I started my seeds to soon and was unable to transplant.
How did your garden do this season and what lessons did you learn for next season?
I left my garden for a few days to visit the grandchildren and when I returned things were jumping. The tomato plants have jumped 2 - 3 feet and lots of tomatoes are on the vines. Oh boy!
I'll be making a few loaves of zucchini bread this week-end out of today's harvest.
I picked my first Sugar Baby today. Since I'm a novice gardener, I guessed as to when it should be picked. I used the thumping method and checked the color of the melon to determine it was time to take this baby into the house and give it its place in the fridge. Supposedly, a sign of ripeness is when the melon turns a dark green and become somewhat dull looking. It was there. Another method was a hollow sound when you thump it. It sounded hollow to me or maybe the sound that I heard was my empty stomach growling and me thinking about consuming this Sugar Baby. Oh well, it's off the vine and I will be eating it real soon. I only have two melons so far. I hope I get a few more.
My Blue Lake bush beans produced a nice little harvest. The wax beans didn't do as well. I'm hoping the pole beans produce a good crop. I want to add a few gallons to the freezer. I do believe that I will do another planting of the bush beans just to be sure that I will have enough. I have an old wash tube that would be perfect for a new crop of beans. I'll put it to use this week-end. Need to get my beans into the fridge so they can stay fresh until I can get them blanched and into the freezer in the morning. How's your garden growing and what are you harvesting? Leave me a comment, I'll pay you a visit to see what's happening in your garden.
I have been fighting with blogger this morning trying to write this post. I hate hate hate the new blogger option. I was so happy that I could temporarily revert back to the old format so I could communicate with you. I hope they work the bugs out before they make the change permanent. I don't understand why people make changes when they have a good thing that works, and the users know how to use the product. So much for my ranting this afternoon.
How cool is this picture. Square watermelons are really popular in Japan and are making their way to the US. I'm thinking about trying this with a few of my Sugar Baby watermelon plants. I've been researching to see how I can turn a round melon into an ice cold delicious square treat, and it seems the way to go with Sugar Babies is a cinder block. Once the melon has matured, you use a sledge hammer to break the block. Not thrilled about having to break block, but I could easily get my hands on a few cinder blocks and call in man power to retrieve the treat.
I'm thinking that square melons would make a nice center piece at a family gathering this summer. I'm sure that I could get my grandson to eat a square watermelon too, lol. The other way of squaring the melon requires Plexiglass squares or a wooden box that I would need to put together. You have to make a hole for the vine and than rig it to get the melon out. We have several plastic companies in the area, so I'll check next week to see if Plexiglass squares are available. I may find that building the squares are too much work this year. I need to put together trellis' and we still need to start the fencing project.
Have any of you grown square watermelons? If so, what method do you use? I'm thinking the concept would work for pumpkins and cantaloupes too.
