Watermelon Harvest

It's fruity dessert time, wha-hoo! Figured out how to tell when watermelon were ripe online, and to save y'all time, it's harvest season when the first curly tendril after the melon stem has turned brown. This is an amazing bit of trivia. Look at these babies! They look like watermelons, certainly, but NOTHING like what the plant stake said they would grow to be when we made our garden purchases. I'm not convinced this was a Lowe's error, but perhaps a little seed juggling occurred at the greenhouse. We bought 3 plant starts labeled, "Black Diamond-Heirloom," that pictured very dark green melons with pink fruit and suspiciously, no seeds. Now, I do know that seedless watermelon are a new development, an Americanized food that can be gobbled down without impediments, but what fooled me was the word, heirloom. I am a complete sucker for this word because my cozy, earth conscious interpretation gives me a sense of well-being, hugging onto the past, and doing my part for ecological diversity. All that from one word: heirloom. Seriously, I don't usually consider myself gullible, but if this word becomes a marketing ploy outside of the local garden center, I am going to have to encase my wallet in cement!

Anyway, back to the watermelons... the cut melon is delicious, very sweet and juicy, notice the large seeds, perhaps the only similarity to the plastic plant tag is that the skin of this watermelon was a very dark green. Note melon #2, also allegedly a "Black Diamond-Heirloom," it appears totally different from any of the characteristics indicated on the plant tag. Fortunately, it is also delicious with traditional pink fruit inside and small seeds; my son and I quartered this pint-size melon and ate it all. I have no clue as to what type of watermelons we grew, but since I can recognize watermelon-y shapes, and flavor I guess we successfully raised two of them. I have to admit that I have missed seedy watermelon, the seeds are fun to spit and they make for a more mindful eating of this juicy fruit. There are still 5 on the vine, so we will continue to enjoy our anonymous watermelon-y treats for a few weeks.