The secret ingredient has finally been revealed. The secret had all of Australia, and most of the world, holding its breath; what would be planted in the second garden bed?
The second garden bed which previously held pumpkins – and an awful lot of weeds. So many weeds that they threatened to strangle the young pumpkin shoots. As a result, I ripped up the garden bed and started again.
The secret ingredient – Rockmelon.
The rockmelon is just minutes from being transferred into its permanent home.
The garden is at the back of a rental property on the south coast of New South Wales, about 2 hours south of Sydney, Australia. The soil is generally fertile in a region famous for dairy farming and viticulture, although the garden had been stripped of much of its nutrients when I moved in, courtesy of the previous tenant’s neglect and a dry winter. The garden attracts quite a lot of sun, during very warm summer months and even during colder winter months in what is typically a temperate climate. The area is also famous for beaches and surfing, which is great after a day of hard yakka in the garden.
The shoots began as seeds which were saved from a rockmelon that I bought from the supermarket. The seeds were placed into a pot with potting mix and watered regularly.
I threw a lot of seeds into the one pot, which is probably not the recommended method, but at the time I had no individual seed trays.
The seeds germinated and gave birth to a substantial amount of baby rockmelons, so I’m assuming it worked anyway. It was interesting to watch the germinated seeds push other seeds up out of the pot as the successful seeds began their journey into the big wide world.
I dug small trenches directly into the soil, added some more potting mix then placed the shoots into the trenches. The babies were then swaddled with soil and grass clippings, before being given a good bath.
They’ve been planted in a garden bed which is placed a good distance from any other plants, because rockmelons are known to be fond of exploring their surroundings.
Hopefully I’ll be snacking on some tasty rockmelons in the near future.
Where are the photos of the new garden bed?
You’ll have to tune in next time for more photos.
kieranblakewriter 