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Juicy sweet watermelons are always associated with summer and sun. The crackling of the striped peel under the knife edge, the characteristic aroma and melting, refreshing flesh. What could be better than, forgetting for a while about business, to enjoy a slice of ripe berry. Today, you can pamper yourself with a watermelon at almost any time of the year. In supermarkets there are always these giant berries, however, grown on the other side of the world or in the greenhouse.
The most delicious watermelon is the one that was saturated with the power of the sun and did not grow under the film, but in the garden.
Many gardeners are wondering how to grow watermelons in the country? Today, all the conditions for this exist. Due to the appearance of early varieties and hybrids, even the inhabitants of the Non-Black Earth region can break their own melon and get a harvest of watermelons. How to grow watermelons in the open field? What care culture requires, and when can the first fruits be removed?
Preparing watermelon seeds for sowing
Of all the melons, watermelons have the hardest-growing seeds. To seedlings were friendly and strong, first the seeds are immersed in salt water. This will allow to identify and remove not vigorous, lightweight specimens, but those that are heavier and sank to the bottom, to be used for sowing.
However, this is not enough. Shortly before planting, seeds are heated for 3-4 hours at temperatures up to 55 ° C or left for a week in the sun in order to disinfect the seed. Then, for a day, the seeds are soaked in warm water, which will accelerate germination and give the germ additional strength.
Planting watermelons with seeds
In the Chernozem region and southern regions, where watermelons are grown in summer cottages and industrial melons, the crop can be planted in open ground with seeds.
The best time for this comes when the ground at a depth of 10 cm warms up to 12–15 ° C.For sandy and other types of light, friable soils, the depth of embedding watermelon seeds is 4–8 centimeters, but if the soil is heavy and dense, it is more correct to deepen the seeds by no more than 4–6 cm. And the smaller the seeds, the smaller the grooves for planting.
Gourds, especially during the period of ripening, require good nutrition, which is provided by the main root system and small roots formed on individual lashes. Therefore, when growing watermelons in open ground, a rather large area is allocated for planting, the size of which depends both on the type of soil and on the variety, as well as on the expected load on the plant.
- If watermelons are sown in rows, between the bushes leave intervals of 0.7 to 1.5 meters. The aisle in this case must be at least one and a half meters.
- When using a square planting scheme between plants, lay a distance from 0.7 to 2.1 meters.
The main thing is that with the growth of planting they should not be overly thickened, and all the berries should start to have enough light, moisture and nutrition.
A rassadny method of growing watermelon
In a midland setting, for example, in non-black-earth regions, as well as in cold, long spring in southern regions, watermelons can be grown in open ground through seedlings. From the moment of sowing to the transplanting of young plants into the soil usually takes from 25 to 35 days. The most convenient way for sowing is to use peat pots with a diameter of about 10 cm, which are filled with a mixture of equal amounts:
- humus;
- turf land;
- peat.
In damp soil, seeds are buried by 3–4 centimeters, after which the pots are left under the film at a temperature not lower than 20–25 ° C, only at night the background temperature can drop to18 ° C
When the seedlings appear above the ground level, the seedlings are transferred to a cooler room. At a temperature of about 17–18 ° C, the seedlings of the watermelon will have to stay for 3 to 4 days, which will make it possible to get strong shoots and prevent them from being pulled out. Later on, the temperature around 22–25 ° C is returned again during the daytime.
Regular watering is carried out with warm water, trying not to fall on the leaf plates. One week after sprouting, sprouts seedlings under the roots are fed with fertilizer containing nitrogen and phosphorus.
Since gourds are heat and light-loving crops, well-lit warm rooms or greenhouses are chosen for young watermelon plants, but a week before the seedlings enter the open ground, it must be hardened. To do this, the transplant boxes are exposed to the open air first for 2-4 hours, then gradually increase the time. In early June or at the end of May, watermelon seedlings are planted on the beds.
Selection of a plot and soil for growing watermelon at the cottage
To obtain a good harvest from a watermelon grown at the cottage, it is important that the plot intended for planting:
- is well lit;
- is closed to cold winds;
- provided the plants with proper nutrition.
The best soil for melons and gourds is light, fertile and loose. It is optimal if, on summer cottages, there is sandy and sandy sandy soil, which since the fall has been enriched with humus or another, well-rotted organic matter.
The best predecessors for watermelons are legumes, cruciferous, including cabbage and radish, as well as potatoes and tomatoes.
Before growing watermelons in the open field, care should be taken to prepare the ridges and fertilize the soil. Per meter beds in the spring make:
- 24-35 grams of ammonium sulfate;
- 40–45 grams of superphosphate;
- 15–25 grams of potash fertilizers.
In the pre-moistened wells located at intervals of 1-1.5 meters planted 1-2 plants or immersed in one peat cup so that the seedbed remains above the soil levelleaves. After planting, the bed is mulched with sand, and the plants are sheltered from the sun. Similarly, when shoots appear, watermelons in the open ground are grown from seeds.
In the first week, while the acclimatization process is underway, watermelons are watered with warm water.
Peculiarities of watering and feeding watermelons
It is impossible to grow a watermelon at the cottage without providing the plant with proper watering and feeding. Without water, it is difficult to talk about the juiciness of sweet berries, but you do not need to overdo it, otherwise you will not achieve such a favorite sugar pulp. Before the appearance of flowers, watermelons are watered sparingly, and when the ovary appears on the lashes - more generously.
In the summer cottage for watermelons, it is convenient to use drip irrigation systems, with which you can carry out regular plant feeding.
Growing watermelons in the country, you need to remember that the culture loves rare but abundant watering, which is essential in the hot season, in conditions of a deficit of natural moisture. The comfort level of soil moisture for watermelons is 85%.On sandy soil, poorly retaining moisture, the beds are watered more often, and on black soil and clay soils - less. When the berries are poured, and their maturation begins, watering is carried out less often, and then stop altogether.
The fertilizing schedule for watermelons grown at the dacha includes three procedures, during each of which the plant should have approximately 2 liters of liquid fertilizer. A week after landing, watermelons are watered with a solution of 10 liters of water:
- 40–50 grams of superphosphate;
- 30–35 grams of ammonium sulfate;
- 15–20 grams of potassium salts.
When active growth of lashes begins on plants, watermelons should receive a second feeding with half the concentration of phosphate and potash fertilizers. Since the beginning of the formation of the ovaries, they carry out another additional feeding, introducing a solution based on:
- 20–25 grams of ammonium sulfate;
- 10 grams of superphosphate;
- 35 grams of potassium salts.
The introduction of the nutrient mixture is carried out in the furrows arranged in advance at a distance of 15–20 cm from the bushes.
A decrease in the proportion of nitrogen fertilizers is associated with the possibility of accumulation of nitrates in the pulp of berries. Also, this measure will push the plants not to a set of green mass, but to ripen.
Caring for watermelons grown in the country
Caring for watermelons growing in the open ground consists of:
- regularly loosening the soil under the plants;
- in watering and feeding melon crops;
- in the removal of weeds;
- in the fight against pests and plant diseases;
- in protection of lashes and ovaries against freezing.
The soil under the plants is loosened to a depth of 7 cm not only after planting, but also after watering and rains, until the lashes and foliage close the space between the individual bushes.
In order to protect the ovaries and shoots from the wind, it is useful to fasten the lash on the ground with the help of wire pins or sprinkling parts of the stem with moist soil.
If in the area where watermelons grow, there is a risk of stagnant moisture or not enough light, trellis is constructed for plants and at the beginning of lash growth they transfer shoots from the ground to strong vertical supports. The same technique is useful if there is not enough space for growing watermelons in the traditional melon at the dacha. As they grow, shoots are distributed on the trellis or laid out on the ground so that one whip does not shade the other.
If watermelon is grown on a trellis in the country, it is recommended to leave only one main whip, which after flowering, depending on the variety and climate, must start from 3 to 6 fruits. The rest of the shoots pinch in the early stages of growth, and then, when the ovary reaches the size of a five-ruble coin, remove the top of the fruit-bearing stem.
When growing watermelons in the open field using the melon and gourd method, pinch all the shoots after 3–6 ovaries, remove the stems that appear from the leaf axils and female flowers.
It is interesting that the cropped side lashes can be rooted and also obtained from them, albeit late and small, but high-quality harvest.
If there is a threat of frost in the area where watermelons grow, plants are protected with cardboard or special covering material.
When to collect watermelons?
Ripening tomatoes are easily recognizable by changing color. With cucumbers and zucchini - most importantly, do not linger on the collection, so that vegetables do not lose juiciness and healthy properties. And when to collect watermelons, how to distinguish a ripe berry from the one that still has to warm its sides in the sun?
The earliest ripening varieties of watermelons in central Russia can yield only by mid-August. At the same time, mass harvesting at the summer cottage is not carried out, unless the berries are threatened with frost. While the warm season lasts, the ripest watermelons are cut off with lashes:
- with glossy dense bark;
- with a deaf, audible sound when tapping;
- with smooth, non-inherent green ovary hairs;
- with a dry bract and a mustache at the base of the leaf.
All these signs of ripeness should be considered together and only then watermelons should be collected, otherwise it is possible that the cut berries will be immature.
However, when watermelons are used for storage or transportation, it is better to take the berries a few days before full ripening. Such watermelons, being in a dry warm room, can ripen without losing any beneficial properties, taste or aroma. But for the seeds are suitable only watermelons, collected in a fully ripe state.
