Summer is here and hopefully your garden crops are showing off. While tomatoes and peppers are quick to show their ripeness, some crops are a bit more secretive. While you can leave your pumpkins and winter squash until the last minute without worrying about them getting too ripe, you’ll want to pick summer crops like corn and watermelon at their peak ripeness. Here’s how.
How do you know when your corn is ready to harvest?
Watermelons aren’t a quick harvest: you’ll need plenty of summer sunshine to get a decent harvest of watermelons. It’s often best to consider smaller watermelons, like Sugar Baby, since they don’t need as much sun as larger varieties. Still, there’s nothing more devastating than waiting all summer for a melon to ripen, only to pick it and find it’s unripe. Watermelons don’t ripen once they’re picked, so this is an all-or-nothing decision, especially since those sugars in watermelon don’t taste good when the fruit is overripe.
The best way to know if a watermelon on the vine is ready to go is to check the patch. As melons grow, there is usually one patch that is in contact with the ground and protected from the sun, so the melon develops a large white circular patch. As the melon ripens, the patch will turn yellow – that means it's time to go. I repeat: white = not yet. Yellow = now.
Because nature is cruel, not all watermelons have field spot, which means you have to use method B. On the vine, the tendril closest to the melon is a tell-tale sign. If the tendril is green, the melon is unripe. Once the tendril dries out and turns brown, the melon is ripe. Some gardeners also give it a few extra days.
