Where is cantaloupe grown

Fruit is hand-picked between half- and full-slip and will ripen after picking but not increase in sugar content. Cantaloupes at full-slip have reached their maximum sugar development. External color varies at this stage and may be slightly greenish. Multiple harvests and frequent picking ensure premium quality. Later in the growing cycle, pickleworms become a problem as their larvae burrow into the developing fruit to feed.

Other common pests include squash vine borers, seed corn maggots, rootknot nematodes, leafminers , and rindworms cucumber beetle larvae. In addition to bacterial wilt , cantaloupe is susceptible to fusarium wilt , various types of mosaic, alternaria leaf blight, bacterial fruit blotch, phytophtora blight , and anthracnose.

Diseases particular to fruit-sizing include powdery mildew, downy mildew, gummy stem blight , and alternaria stem blight. Application of pesticides, fumigation, crop inspection, careful selection of disease-resistant varieties, and crop rotation are all effective in combating these common pests and diseases. Precooling after harvest is important for postharvest quality.

Higher humidity may result in stem-scar and surface mold. Cantaloupe is divided into several grades: U. Fancy, U. Commercial, and U. Fertilizer rates should be based on annual soil test results; if you are unable to conduct a test, the recommended N-P-K application rates are pounds per acre. A large, active honey bee population is essential for complete pollination and fruit set. One hive per acre is recommended for maximum fruit production. Insecticides applied to flowers or weeds in bloom can adversely affect populations of pollinating insects.

With some insect pests infecting cantaloupes during bloom, extreme care must be taken in the choice of insecticides during this crucial period. A good integrated pest management program is critical in cantaloupe production to ensure high-quality produce. If you plan on using pesticides, you must obtain the proper license to purchase and use them on your farm.

Contact your local Penn State Extension office or regional office of the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture for more information on pesticide licensing and application of restricted-use pesticides.

Weed management can be achieved with a good crop-rotation system, early cultivation, plastic mulch, and herbicides. Several preplant and postemergence herbicides are available for cantaloupes, depending on the specific weed problem and cantaloupe growth stage. If infestation levels are low, early cultivation before vine running can help minimize weed problems. Insects are a major problem in cantaloupe production. Early feeding by striped or spotted cucumber beetles on young transplants can result in the plants being infected with bacterial wilt.

Because these beetles carry this disease, insect management is an important part of disease management.

Cucumber beetle, aphids, squash vine borer, seed corn maggot, leafminers, and rindworms cucumber beetle larvae can also cause crop losses. Monitoring insect populations with traps or by scouting will help you determine when or if you should use pesticides and how often you should spray. Several cantaloupe diseases can cause crop losses, including bacterial wilt, Fusarium wilt, and viruses such as cucumber mosaic, squash mosaic, and watermelon mosaic, as well as powdery mildew, downy mildew, and gummy stem blight.

These diseases can be controlled by planting disease-resistant cultivars see Table 1 for cultivars that have resistance to the various races of powdery mildew and Fusarium wilt , having a good crop-rotation system, growing on sites which have good air and soil water drainage, and selectively using fungicides. Cantaloupes are hand-harvested at the full-slip stage of maturity for best taste and texture. At full slip, the stem pulls away from the fruit, leaving a scar at the stem end.

Because individual fruit are pollinated at different times, multiple harvests are typical. After harvest, check cantaloupes for size, maturity, and pest damage to ensure you are marketing a high-quality product. You should refrigerate cantaloupes immediately after harvest to maintain quality. Cooling cantaloupes will remove field heat, which improves their shelf life. Harvesting cantaloupes into bins and moving them to a shady area as quickly as possible will begin the cooling process.

Marketing cantaloupes at harvest or renting cold storage space will eliminate the need for building and maintaining your own cold storage equipment.

All agricultural operations in Pennsylvania, including small-scale and part-time farming enterprises, operate under the Pennsylvania Clean Streams Law. A specific part of this law is the Nutrient Management Act.

Portions of the act may or may not pertain to your operation, depending on whether you have livestock on your farm. However, all operations may be a source of surface water or groundwater pollution. Because of this possibility, you should contact your local Soil and Water Conservation District to determine what regulations may pertain to your operation. The idea behind these programs is to ensure a safer food system by reducing the chances for foodborne illnesses resulting from contaminated products reaching consumers.

Also, several major food distribution chains are beginning to require GAP- and GHP-certified products from their producers. These programs set standards for worker hygiene, use of manure, and water supply quality. These practices require an inspection from a designated third party, and there are fees associated with the inspection. Prior to an inspection, you will need to develop and implement a food safety plan and designate someone in your operation to oversee this plan.

You will need to have any water supply used by your workers or for crop irrigation and pesticide application checked at least twice each year. For more information about GAP and GHP, contact your local extension office or your state's department of agriculture. FMSA governs recordkeeping, health and hygiene, water quality, and animal waste used as fertilizer, among additional requirements. You should carefully consider how to manage risk on your farm. First, you should insure your facilities and equipment.

This may be accomplished by consulting your insurance agent or broker. It is especially important to have adequate levels of property, vehicle, and liability insurance.

You will also need workers compensation insurance if you have any employees. You may also want to consider your needs for life and health insurance and if you need coverage for business interruption or employee dishonesty.

For more on agricultural business insurance, see "Agricultural Alternatives: Agricultural Business Insurance. Second, check to see if there are multi-peril crop insurance programs available for your crop or livestock enterprises. There are crop insurance programs designed to help farmers manage both yield risk and revenue shortfalls. However, individual crop insurance coverage is not available for all crops.

If individual coverage is not available for what you grow, you may be able to use the Whole Farm Revenue Protection WFRP program to insure the revenue of your entire farm operation. Operations that have expanded over time may be allowed to increase the approved revenue amount based on an indexing procedure. Depending on the number of commodities grown, you have the choice of coverage of 50 to 85 percent of your approved revenue.

WFRP also provides replant coverage if it not already covered under an underlying individual crop policy. Finally, the USDA Farm Service Agency has a program called the Noninsured Assistance Program NAP that is designed to provide a minimal level of yield risk protection for producers of commercial agricultural products that don't have multi-peril crop insurance coverage.

NAP is designed to reduce financial losses when natural disasters cause catastrophic reduction in production. Higher levels of protection at the 50, 55, 60, and 65 percent levels at percent of the average market price are available for an additional premium. The application fee for this program may be waived for eligible limited-resource farmers. A sample fresh-market cantaloupe production budget is included in this publication.

This budget utilizes custom hire for most of the field work, which could be more economical for small-acreage growers. My vines blossom and the next day it looks like something is digging into the root of the plant.

Should I put something under the fruit, like cardboard while fruit is still growing, like watermelon? I love in Texas it's not hear all the time we have a farmer's market and one gentleman has the sweetest cantaloupe I've ever eaten and his watermelon is excellent the hot sun he is from Pecos Tx!!!

I am going to use his seeds thanks for sharing your information!!!! I bought a delicious cantaloupe musk melon from Fairway. It was so good I decided to try to grow my own and gathered the seeds, dried them, stored them in a dark space and planted last year in peat pots and then to small garden.

Unbelievable - I got a 14 lb for the first one. All amazingly delicious. This year I went to my same seeds stored in the same place and planted the same way in pots and out of sunlight to no avail.

After 4 weeks I broke open peat pot s and none spouted. Can seeds go bad? That sounds like it was quite a yield last year! Seeds do go bad eventually unless frozen and stored professionally , but cantaloupe seeds typically last longer than one or two years if stored properly. However, if you planted that same seeds this year that you have previously had success with, perhaps they were not stored properly or were simply bad seeds.

After drying the seeds completely, store them in an air-tight container in a fridge or cool cellar. We have a melon vine which has produced a few melons, however the melons are cracking open from the base of the fruit before ripening.

What causes this? Can we prevent cracking on future melons? Melons crack due to stress, usually from soil that holds too much water or from inconsistent watering. In the fall, add compost to where you will grow melons next year to make for a well-draining mix. Also, melons enjoy pH of 6. For watering, try to water 1 to 2 inches a week when there is no rain. Is there a temperature at which muskmelons will no longer ripen?

We are having highs in the 70's this October, with lows in the 50's. I live in Saskatchewan, Canada, and for the first time have planted cantaloupe in my raised gardens.

I have two plants and 5 lovely green cantaloupes. However, we will soon be experiencing frost, and I am wondering how susceptible cantaloupes are to frost.

I look forward to receiving an email with an answer. Thank you very much. Labor-intensive, but it can be done! Good luck and thanks for asking!

Where did the Rocky Ford cantaloupe seeds originally come from years ago? Cantaloupe were not native plants. The modern melon we know today was not imported but was created by the Burpee company who introduced this cultivar in the early s. This was a different kind of melon with a net-like skin covering. It became known as the Rocky Ford melon named for the region of Colorado. It was landowner, politician, and entrepreneur George Washington Swink who helped built the melon industry; he transformed the region by developing a canal-based irrigation system; he also introduced honeybees to the region and invented the cantaloupe crate.

Later, California and other states built up their melon business and surpassed Colorado. I grew cantalopes from seed. I never did this before. I didn't know when to pick it. I picked it and cut it open but is was not ripe yet. Is there anything I can do to make it ripe after already cutting it open and taking seeds out. Skip to main content.

You are here Gardening » Growing Guides. Planting, Growing, and Harvesting Cantaloupes. By The Editors. When to Plant Cantaloupes Cantaloupes may be started from seed or purchased as young plants.