Kitchen Garden Forum

For the first time ever I have an orange melon actually looking pretty good, so good in fact it has loads of flowers and about 3 separate stems trying to do their thing. In my mind I had a vision of a similar thing to squash with just one stem as watermelon do that, but sometimes 2 stems.

What is the recommendations for getting the best chance of a couple of ripe fruit - do I just choose one stem to train around, knowing I have to limit it to just a couple of fruitlets or should I pick a couple of the stems & just let them have 1 fruit each. This one that has gone mental is in the greenhouse at home, all I can say about the 2 in the tunnel is that they are alive, but where there is life there is hope & some very warm weather may encourage them to wake up as well.

Cheers in advance!

Not much advice I can offer you Westi. My only successful melon attempt was one very hot summer when I grew just one fruit the size of a grapefruit because although I had other tiny fruitlets forming, they withered and died when they were little bigger than the size of a raw broad bean. I'd be tempted to just grow one fruit per stem unless they're growing in very well manured conditions with enough nutrition to support a bigger crop. Best of luck !

Thank you Primrose! I kinda of knew it would have to have a trim despite it's obvious health at the moment! Decisions, decisions! No fruitlets yet & stems well thin so wouldn't support even a tiny fruit! I'm thinking a flush of male flowers is what I am seeing & just getting over excited by the number of bees visiting that I might even get a fruit even if just tiny!

I will brave the spiders & unravel it from the frame & check a bit more closely. Gardeners PPE at the ready then!