It Have Forever Wondered Why The Honeydew

Thumbnail image of Bob Bauer
Bob Bauer
August 03, 2019 (Last Updated: ) | Reading Time: 2 minutes

August 03, 2019

It have forever wondered why the honeydew melons took longer to ripen than the watermelon, because they both have an 85 day maturity date. I pulled out my box of seed packets and found that some honeydew have 110 day maturity dates. One time I read they had 85 day maturity and assumed it was true for all honeydew. How many beliefs have I got that are not based on facts? An awful lot of what we think we know can come from a tiny part of the truth..

The honeydew continue to need an abundance of water while the watermelon needs to be cut back. I use a five gallon bucket next to my orbital sprinkler to block water from the watermelon, and still soak the honeydew and cantaloupe on either side of it. This works for your tomatoes too..

August 04, 2019

If I brought a spoon down to the garden I wouldn't have to carry so many cantaloupe up to the house. If I brought a salt shaker I bet I would eat more cucumbers. I had two ears of raw corn on the cob the other day and when I told my wife how good they were she said to "knock it off". She knew if I got in the habit of eating them raw, fewer would make it to the dinner table. Tomato juice on the front of my t shirt is a common occurrence this time of year, and raw green beans are as tasty as cooked..

Some strawberries are too ripe to survive the long journey up to the house so they must be dispatched post haste. My son reminded me that probiotics on the surface of veggies shouldn't be washed off, which is true if you have home grown produce. I don't wash what I eat when I'm grazing in the garden, but the tomatoes that have been sitting on the kitchen window sill to ripen aways get washed, because some days we have more flies in the house than in the garden..

August 05, 2019

"Sitt'n in the shade". That's what us old time gardeners call gardening this time of year. Morning picking only takes about an hour as we stretch our backs picking zucchini, crawl around finding cucumbers, sniff the honeydew melons, rummage through the tomato vines, brush the bush beans leaves out of the way, peel the corn cob sheaths back, push on the cantaloupe stems and poke our fingers into the ground to see where water is needed next. Then the sprinkler will be put somewhere and it's our duty to watch it for awhile. It's kind of like a requirement for successful gardening to spend some time watching the sprinkler..

If your garden doesn't bring you joy it may be because you are too busy trying to improve it, and don't spend enough time just being with it. Close your eyes and listen for awhile. We are so used to the excitement of visual input that we have lost the ability to hear the subtle sounds of nature..

More from Efundies