Squash & cucumbers
Cantaloupe (muskmelon)
Spring crop on the summer bench; sow April.
- Outside
- Direct Apr, soil 65F
- Where
- In ground or raised bed, room to run
- Sun
- Full sun
- Water
- Deep weekly soak; step up in August
- Harvest
- Jul to Sep, pick at the slip
Care
- Water
- Deeply and about weekly, in the early morning on the soil; skip any week that brings half an inch of rain, and lean toward the county's 1 to 2 inch August target while the fruit sizes. Mulch deep before July; the melons ride out the driest month on a steady soak.
- Sow
- Direct sow in April into soil that holds 65F, the county's melon class: hills of 2 to 3 seeds thinned to the strongest, with room to run. One spring sowing is the county practice; the state table's fall row never became one here.
- Feed
- Compost worked into the hill at planting, then a light fish-and-seaweed feed as the vines run. Hold all feeding through the July-August heat.
- Ready
- Vine-ripe is the point: a ripe muskmelon slips its stem with a light lift, and the netting stands out over a gold background. Pick at the slip and use it fast. An April sowing ripens across the summer bench, from July into September.
- Trouble
- Rotation is the sheet's rule, as for every melon: no melons in the same spot more than once every 3 or 4 years. The heat carries the crop; these sit on the summer bench with the watermelons, ripening through weather that stalls the rest of the bed.
In a bag?
- No
- Melons are not container crops in any source surveyed, and a fruit sizing through August wants the root run and moisture buffer of a mulched bed; the research verdict is a bed crop under the 15 gallon cap.
Cantaloupe shares the watermelon's slot on the summer bench: sow once in April, and the vines carry the heat, ripening muskmelons through late summer.
Growing
Same sheet, same window: the state table plants melons 1 to 6 weeks after frost, April in practice, into soil of at least 65F, and the climate note files them on the summer bench with the crops that carry the heat. One spring sowing ripens from July into September. The statewide fall row is the honest-catch footnote: it computes to late July but is not a county practice and would start a crop into the worst heat of the year, so the entry stays spring-only. Rotate the bed; 3 or 4 years between melon plantings in the same spot.
Varieties
The state's muskmelon list is long and strong: Ambrosia, Caravelle, Hale's Best, Israeli, Magnum 45, Mainstream, Mission, Perlita, TAM Uvalde and Tendersweet. Any of them is the right packet here.
Pests
The sheet's rule is the same rotation the watermelons keep: no melons in the same place more than once every 3 or 4 years. Beyond it the surveyed sources stay quiet on melon pests.
In the kitchen
Fresh off the rind and as agua fresca, the two uses the research names for both melons. The fruits ripen a few at a time through the bench; the ones that soften past slicing sweeten the pitcher.