Due to its magnificent flavor, watermelon is served as a perfect dessert or made into smoothies and juices during summertime. Because of that, people love this type of fruit so much that they have started to grow them in their backyard or garden.
If you are a melon lover and you are on your way to growing this fruit, you probably wonder how many watermelons per plan that a healthy and qualified crop should have.
In this article, not only do we provide the answer to this question, but we also further knowledge you need to know before growing watermelons. If you want to have a successful watermelon crop, scroll down for more!
How Plant Spacing Affects Watermelons?
Since watermelons thrive by stretching their vines, this type of plant needs more space to grow. Not only that but allowing more space to grow watermelons also helps the vines to have a better light and water condition. This is not to mention the larger space per plant becomes, the more nutrients the plants are able to absorb. In other words, how many watermelons per plant depends on how large the space for each plant is.
The limited planting space adversely affects how many watermelons per plant, which means that the vines will not produce as many watermelons as when they are grown in larger spaces. Furthermore, narrow planting space also hinders the fruits from reaching to its full size.
Watermelon Variety & Spacing
If you have just started to grow this type of fruit, you should remember that different varieties of watermelon require different spacing. It is also noticeable that depending on what variety it is, the size of a watermelon can be from 5 pounds (2,3kg) to over 30 pounds (14kg).
If you have a big garden and you choose to grow large-size watermelons such as Royal Majesty, Crimson Sweet, and PeDee Sweet, the proper growing area for each plant should be 4ft by 6ft.
Meanwhile, if you do not have enough space for large-size watermelons, you should opt for small varieties, including Sugar Baby, Petite Treat, Charleston Gray, or Jubilee. These are small-sized varieties capable of growing in the space of 2ft by 4ft for each plant as they grow into bushes.
Watermelon varieties with fruits weighing less than 10 pounds can also be planted in the space of only 18 inches by 18 inches (0,45 m2). One more advantage of growing small-sized varieties is that we can use trellises to make space for the watermelon vines to spread out.
How Many Watermelons Per Plant?
The answer to the question “How many watermelons per plant?” depends on many factors - from which type of watermelon gardeners choose to how well they take care of the plants. It is estimated that, in general, a garden-grown plant provides from 1 to 8 fruits.
Meanwhile, a commercial plant could only provide 1 or 2 fruits. This is because every commercial watermelon plant is grown within a very narrow space.
When the vines start the flowering process, both males and female flowers appear on the plants. On average, there is one female flower in every seven males. Once the male flowers fall off the plant, the female ones turn to baby watermelons.
At this stage, those who are new to growing watermelons may feel that they have a successful crop as there are so many baby watermelons. However, most of these baby watermelons will soon fall off, leaving the strongest one to continue growing up. By the time the watermelons are fully grown, gardeners will truly see how many watermelons per plant: there are about 2-4 fruits on each plant on average.
Why and How You Should Prune Watermelon Plants
Why Should You Prune Watermelon Plants?
To increase your watermelon yields, pruning the plants is necessary. We know that watermelon vines spread out very quickly, and they can reach the length of 3 meters.
Yet, if the vines continue to grow, the plant cannot focus the nutrients from the soil for the fruits to grow. This adversely affects how many watermelons per plant as a result, and the fruits themselves are unable to grow into decent size.
With that being said, gardeners should prune their watermelon vines to make the vines healthier and allow the fruits to thrive. To be specific, pruning the plants helps remove unhealthy vines as well as puny, undersized fruits to help the healthy ones reach their decent size.
How
Despite the mentioned upsides, pruning plants do more harm than good if you do not do it properly. If you prune the vines after watering them or when they are still wet, the vines are likely to get ill since the water provides ideal conditions for diseases to thrive.
Not only that, if gardeners prune the vines too soon, they may inadvertently remove all of the female flowers, which means that there will be no fruits.
The pruning process should be done correctly for a good harvest. All you need is a clean shear specialized for gardening. Furthermore, the pruning process is quite simple: gardeners only have to look carefully and prune off dead or withering vines. Vines and fruits that poorly grow or get infected should be removed as well. If possible, you should also prune the sub-vines to allow the main vines to grow. Remember: You must do the pruning process once the plants dry!
Conclusion
To wrap things up, the answer for how many watermelons per plant is from 2 or 4 on average. If this is the first time for you to grow watermelons, we believe the provided information is helpful for you. We hope that you, our gardeners, will have a successful watermelon crop so that you can enjoy yourself-grown slices of watermelons during summertime!
