A Verdant Sea of Vines
by Amy Goldman

Rhinebeck gardener and author Amy Goldman has devoted many years of her life to cultivating and promoting heirloom melons. One of the offshoots of that effort is the recent publication of her book, Melons for the Passionate Grower (Artisan Publishers; photographs by Victor Schrager). Here are a few passages from that volume about the joys and do's and don'ts of growing oldfashioned varieties of non-biotech, non-hybrid melons.

Entering the melon patch is like walking into a candy store. It's the dessert course, only better. Easy to grow, melons gratify instantly, producing luscious fruit in one season. The taste of melons at their peak, oozing honey, is incomparable, as is the air, redolent with muskmelon, on an August night.

In May or June, scores of heirloom melon plants spring up in my garden, blanketed by tents of spun polyester cloth atop black plastic mulch. They are protected from the elements by diatomaceous earth (an organic pest control), a spritz of Bt (Bacillus thuringiensis), and TLC (tender loving care). What more can I do but pray for sun? After the floodwaters of June recede and the first hatch of insect pests has passed, I remove the protective coverings and let the melons sprawl, at ease, until the garden becomes a verdant sea of vines bearing fruit.

The green bowling balls that pass for watermelons or the melons posing as cantaloupes in grocery stores across America don't begin to describe the world of melons. We've all seen melons that are netted, wrinkled, striped, or ribbed; but there are melons with warts, freckles, and stars; melons that look like snakes or bananas; others that smell or taste like pineapple, mango, peach, or perfume. These are extraordinary heirlooms.

Heirloom fruits and vegetables are treasures from the past, carefully tended and preserved by generations of farmers and gardeners. They are beloved for their looks and their taste. I can't count the number of times someone has tasted one of my melons for the first time and said, "This brings back memories of my childhood," or "I'm in ecstasy." At a taste test of my melons at the Union Square Greenmarket, there was almost a stampede. Until they tasted heirlooms, the crowd didn't know what they were missing. But the delight of melons that taste sublime is only one reason to grow heirloom fruits and vegetables. The other is because we need their germplasm. It's their genes that will help us fend off the potato famines and corn blights of the future. Without their genetic diversity, we will be prey to ever-more virulent pests and diseases.

My goal is nothing less than to see a melon patch in every potager: an area consecrated to the growing of heirloom melons in kitchen gardens across America. Melons are not as easy to grow as tomatoes, but you don't need a staff of gardeners and a greenhouse, either. They are a luxury nearly everyone can afford to grow, and if you are blessed with a long, dry summer, they produce luscious fruit in just a few months. The main ingredient for success is what the astute seedsman and melon connoisseur Pierre-Joseph Jacquin long ago called the vigilance of the gardener.

Through the wonders of modern technology, you can duplicate the growing conditions of melon's native Africa. None of the melons takes kindly to frost, but if you don't have a decent interval between spring and fall freezes, there are ways to stretch the season.

The first step is to make a comfortable bed for your melons to lie on. If you're lucky, your soil is light, deep, and well-drained; sandy loam is best. If not, you can provide enough plant nutrients by adding soil amendments.

The biggest mistake beginners make is rushing the season. Plant your melons after the threat of frost has passed and the soil has warmed to at least 60 degrees Fahrenheit. The average safe planting-out day in our area is Memorial Day weekend.

I've been growing melons since I was a teenager, and black plastic mulch has always carpeted my melon patch. True, it's not a thing of beauty, but if you want a garden that really produces, the six-millimeter-thick polyethylene is the ticket. The rationale: it raises soil temperature, conserves moisture, eliminates weeds--and weeding--and keeps fruits clean and free of rot. Melons grow faster, flower sooner, and produce more fruits. Use earth staples (u-shaped pins), stones, and bricks to anchor the plastic to the ground and cut holes two feet in diameter at ten-foot intervals. Watermelons can be given even wider berth.

Melons need a regular supply of water throughout the season. I recommend drip irrigation, which prevents diseases caused by overhead watering.

The best way to fight pests and diseases is to stop them before they get started. I use diatomaceous earth and Bt, and am careful to remove plants, even single leaves, that show signs of disease. Large yellow balloons, with eyes painted on and silvery streamers, scare off crows, while loosely wrapped, spun polyester cloth prevents developing fruits from being defaced by marauding cucumber beetles.

Once fruits have formed, prune off the "cull" melons (the defective ones) and leave only two or three fruits on each plant. This will make the melons bigger and sweeter. After you've done all this, you can sit back and let the melons do what they do best--vine and branch out.

For mouth-watering photographs and more information about growing melons and preserving the heirloom seeds that are part of our global environmental heritage, buy a copy of Melons for the Passionate Grower at one of our local bookstores and visit Amy Goldman's website at www.agoldthumb.com.