Watermelon Landrace Update

On May 15th I planted the watermelon patch. Since I'm doing a landrace I planted the pollinators (Congo, Joseph Lofthouse Landrace and Hopi Red) on three corners of the patch. Those were started in the greenhouse. The Hopi Red and JLL were immediately eaten by insects, the Congo had no problems so it is considerably further along than the rest.

On the same day I planted 25 watermelon seeds from last year's crosses.

At this point (6/15) there are 15 left. Others failed to thrive (2) or were entirely eaten by insects. Several didn't come up at all.

Of the fifteen, three are obviously thriving.

Others...aren't.

Most of them are somewhere in between.

To this point I've only been removing those that were obviously dead or dying--seed leaves without any green, secondary leaves not developing. At the end of June (probably) I'll be sorting it down to five.

I'm tempted to leave more than five, although that would probably crowd them too much. These fifteen survived the sandy soil, lack of water, intermittent heat and cold, insect attack, and even being stepped on (oops). My plant-brain says they deserve to survive. The thinking brain says get rid of the weakest.

We'll see.

Watermelon Landrace

This was scheduled to be published 5/25 and it didn't happen

In short form, a landrace is a locally adapted variety of a plant, often a food plant. Up until the advent of "perfect" food requirements in grocery stores, landraces were the norm rather than the exception. Farmers would trade seeds, knowing from experience that different varieties made for stronger plants.

Over generations, much of that landrace heritage has been lost, to the point that most people believe hybrids to be bad or weak. We plant one variety of squash, one variety of tomato, one variety of beans, and then when the circumstances aren't precisely right for that plant it dies or doesn't produce. This is the plant kingdom's version of siblings marrying generation after generation after generation. Of course the genetics are going to be weak.

With humans we accept the fact that inbreeding is a problem, but in our food we want stability and perfect taste, and we breed for those things. As variations are deliberately bred out of our crops, so are the abilities that made their ancestors thrive.

I've said before and I'll say it again (probably often) that I want strong, self sufficient monster plants that will spit "not good enough" back in my face and thrive in spite of my neglect. In order to do this we need to have variety in the plant genes. There have to be ancestors that thrived in desert conditions, ancestors that resisted insect attack, ancestors that have the perfect taste we love, etc. Over time it all comes together.

Last year I started a watermelon landrace, so this year I should get a bunch of first generation hybrids. Last year I ended up with four varieties of watermelon--Jubilee, Sugar Baby, Ali Baba, and an old variety that I've been growing for years. I have no idea what the ancestry is, so I just call it Traditional.

I pollinated a bunch of flowers, but only one survived (this is normal for watermelons). It was an Ali Baba female parent, crossed with Sugar Baby and Traditional. So this year I should get Ali Baba-sugar baby crosses and traditional-Ali Baba crosses. That being the case, I will not be planting Ali Baba, Sugar Baby, or Traditional. I will be re-planting Jubilee, but only as a pollen donor.

Three new varieties will be introduced into the landrace this year; Congo, Hopi Red, and Joseph Lofthouse Landrace. Congo I already have seeds for but it got eaten by bugs last year. Hopi Red (an established landrace) is drought tolerant, and the JLL includes hundreds of different varieties.

I will watch and see which plants the bugs and snails like, which take off and thrive in my yard, which shrivel at the first hint of cold, and probably about mid-June I'll cull the landrace patch to the strongest. I'll leave the Hopi Red, Congo and JLL--they will be pollen donors only, I won't be keeping seeds from them. The seeds will be taken from the Landrace watermelons that survive.

This is the "hybrid" year, working with first generation crosses of three heirloom varieties. 2019 will be the first year we start to see the results of true variety mixing, and first generation hybrids with the new varieties from 2018. 2020 should be the turning point with my watermelon landrace, meaning the point where I'll begin to see true adaptation to my environment, my water, my soil.

Adaptation

I harvest my own seeds. It's been a while since new seeds came into my yard, but this year I had a friend who wasn't able to have her own garden so I have several varieties of "new" tomatoes, as well as various summer and winter squash and pie pumpkins. It almost feels like I'm being invaded. :) By seeds and plants, not by people.

I don't want anything in my yard to be genetically modified, and as we move more and more toward a Monsanto controlled and owned food supply the list of things being genetically modified grows every year. Apples, sugar beets, corn, wheat. Several hundred varieties of GMO potatoes were approved a few years ago, and while they are currently "not available to the public" I would prefer not to chance my stocks being contaminated. There are a number of reasons for that, but it comes down to unproved safety, the litigious nature of Monsanto, and distrust of a government supported monopoly. They want complete control of our food supply and I'm not going to participate in that.

The only thing in my yard that could possibly be GMO is the corn, because of pollen drift. Everything else is hand pollinated and bagged, or it's built in such a way that accidental crossing is unlikely/impossible (beans, peppers, tomatoes). I've had most of these seeds for upwards of ten years, and some all my life. Others were gifts from people I know back before those particular items were approved for genetic modification.

My days of indiscriminately collecting seeds at every opportunity are over.

Then there's a little quirk of my property that just seems to kill everything. Seeds don't germinate, or they germinate and die, or the bugs get them. First generation I think I probably have a 30% success rate for most things. Some things grow but never flower. Others flower but never fruit. Some don't grow at all.

I've learned to live with it. It's just one more reason NOT to introduce new plants, because it's the first generation that's like this. If the plant grew on my property and I got seeds, the 2nd generation plants will be better. Third generation seeds will thrive.

I've been growing some unknown variety of watermelons for about five years now. Saved from a watermelon we had at a family gathering when I was maybe fifteen, it has adapted quite well. This year I planted several other varieties and waited anxiously to see the female blossoms. Nothing, nothing, nothing. Then, before I'd even seen female blossoms, I had three fruit four inches long on the plant from my own seeds. The others were weeks behind.

Adapted. Someday all my food will be adapted to my soil, my wind, my air. And it will be A. Maze. Ing.