Hand pollination

I found and pollinated 4 girl watermelon blooms. I really don't think I did this right since I think I read that they should close again after they are pollinated and I did not notice them doing that. I tied a ribbon on each one so that I could keep watch on them. I sure hope this works. The 2 cantaloupe plants also have blooms all over but I can't really tell which is the girl and which is the boy with these so they are on their own.

I also used a drill today for the first time ever. I hung my trellises on the back of the garage. I love this drill and I'll be looking for other ways to use it. These things have been leaning up against the garage for a month because I thought it would be so difficult to mount them. It was easy! Who needs handymen!

I am my Watermelon's pimp

During my daily reads I noticed that Christa over at http://cc-calendula.blogspot.com/ was sporting a nice sized melon on her blog. I was very shocked because last week when I read her blog where she posted her baby watermelon pic, I was saying to myself "I have one of those too!" but mine shriveled up and died a few days ago (RIP baby mel). So as I'm reading her blog I realize that there is some fertilization/pollination/plant-sex type of activity that needs to go on before any melons can be born and that, much to my surprise, what I THOUGHT was a baby melon, was just a swollen "ovary" - GROSS!

So I did more research and then the pieces started falling into place. Ohhhhhhh there are boy and girl blooms - THAT'S why they look different! Ohhhhhhh, THAT'S why people are complaining about not seeing bees (i thought they were nuts). Ohhhhhhh that's why it turned black and died!

And since I too have seen no bees, I'll be setting out on a mission to artificially inseminate my watermelon starting tomorrow. I have to say I'm fairly grossed out by this whole thing, but I do love watermelon and it is my favorite thing in the garden and it's only right that it bear fruit, yes?