How to Tell When Corn and Watermelon Are Ready to Harvest
Summer is approaching and hopefully your garden is overflowing. While tomatoes and peppers make it easy to see their ripeness, some crops are more secretive. While you can leave pumpkins and winter squashes until the last minute without fear of them becoming overripe, you want to harvest summer crops like corn and watermelon at the peak of their ripeness. Here’s how.
When to pick watermelons
Watermelons don’t produce a quick harvest – you need plenty of sun throughout the summer to really get a decent harvest of watermelons. It is often helpful to consider smaller watermelons, such as Sugar Baby , as they require less time in the sun than larger varieties. However, there is nothing more devastating than waiting all summer for a melon to be ready and then picking it and discovering it is underripe. Watermelons don’t ripen once they’re picked, so it’s an all-or-nothing decision, especially since the sugar in watermelon doesn’t taste good if the fruit is overripe.
The best way to know if a standing watermelon is ready to eat is to test the area in the field. As the melon grows, one spot is usually in contact with the ground and protected from the sun, so a large white round spot appears on the melon. As the melon ripens, the spot turns yellow, which means it’s time. I repeat: white = not yet. Yellow = now.
Because nature is cruel, not all watermelons have a field spot, which means you’ll have to use Method B. On the vine, the tendril closest to the melon is the gossiper. If the tendril is green, the melon is unripe. Once the tendril dries and turns brown, the melon is ripe. Some gardeners also give it a few more days after this.
We hope that between these two control points you will enjoy the summer with only the ripest watermelons.
When to Harvest Corn
When it comes to crops, corn is a tricky bitch. Some years it can be the easiest crop to harvest when fate and weather align and you end up with squares of sturdy stems seven feet tall. And there are years like this when my corn has a spotty start and only pitiful miniature ears of corn grow. Corn has many specific needs, from the nitrogen-rich pig, which will likely need a blood meal at least once a season, to a favorite target of squirrels and birds. You also need enough of it in the block so that it can be wind pollinated. If you manage to grow cobs, you don’t want to waste any, as freshly harvested corn is so sweet that it doesn’t even need to be cooked.
The first clue is corn silk. You want to see fertile silk (one for each kernel of corn) and you want the silk to be brown and dry. If the silk is still yellow, wait. Then feel the ends of the corn cobs. Although varieties vary, generally you want a rounded (not pointed) end of the cob—it’s rounded because of the plumpness of the kernels. The ear should bend away from the stalk, which happens when it is ready to be harvested.
Some less specific signs that require an ear to be sacrificed include peeling enough of the husk so that you can touch the kernel with your fingernail to see if it produces milk, a sure sign of ripeness. By peeling the cob, you will also see how many kernels there are.
Corn is a short crop and typically takes less than 100 days to harvest, often as little as 70. Many gardeners believe that the number of days stated on the seed packet is as good as religion as to when to check. for readiness, but I always look at the harvest days on the bag as a rough guide rather than a fact.
In any case, you should not harvest corn until you need to eat it. Once you harvest the corn, the sugar will begin to convert and you will begin to lose the sweetness. You’ve gone to great lengths to grow it, so you want to make sure you enjoy it at its peak flavor.