Hey, I know the answers to some of these. I grew them last year, and think they are a fantastic crop. I grew them up on a trellis/A-frame type structure I made out of bamboo poles, but they get much bigger than that and trailed all through my corn. Basically, it's just like growing squash. Vines can be about 15 to 20 feet, so they like a lot of space. I'm in Michigan, so it's pretty much S.O.P. here to start all warm weather crops ahead of time in the greenhouse and transplant. I don't know if that's necessary in warmer climates. It would probably depend also on the specific variety of winter melon you're growing, and how long it takes to mature. I grew some hybrid types from Kitizawa that make only small fruits and are rated around 80 days to maturity. But I understand some of the largest fruited types require as long as 125 or more days, so variety would make a difference. I got quite a few fruits off of mine. I've just been keeping them on a wire shelf in my basement, and they've kept great. Out of about 3-4 dozen fruit, only 4 have rotted. I've used or given away most of them. I have about a dozen left, and they look just like they did day 1. It's about 60 degrees down there and actually quite dry for a basement, since I run a dehumidifier to prevent mold from growing on the walls behind the furniture and cabinets.

pnbrown What is planting fabric? Landscape fabric? I don't have to worry about weeds in my containers since they're on a high deck. Well, not many, mostly little trees that sprout from those airborne helicopters and whirligigs that I miss when they land. As for spacing them, I think you could go blind with the seeds! Peggy, I've occasionally made seed tapes too, though not for such small seeds! But, to my main question, PNB. You're saying that vendors of onion transplants OR commercial onion growers just plant them close together and then they can be separated and spaced after reaching transplant size? So you seem to be saying that if I plant them at the right time and have some kind of reasonable spacing, I could leave them there to grow in the spring -- is that right?

Generally it is a good idea to plant more than one melon vine to increase the number of bees which visit, but Crenshaws should be able to self-pollenize with a little help from insects. Melons may be oddly shaped and undersized if there are few insects and only a few of the seeds inside get pollenized. Do not do any pruning until after melons have set and started growing. Then you can choose those with the nicest shape and take off other fruits to direct energy to the remaining fruits. Four seems like a lot to me unless your plant is very vigorous. This is late in the season for Crenshaws (especially the traditional ones) to be setting fruit. I would probably go for a couple of melons if I were you in hopes of getting ripe ones during warm weather. If it were an earlier melon, I might let a second wave of fruit to form.

....and finally, if all you can get locally are the 6-footers, then plant away and in all probability, they'll do fine. One thing about pine-family members, they do transplant readily, even larger sized ones. This due in part to shallow root systems , although all trees' root systems are more shallow than is sometimes held in the popular imagination. But a pancake-shaped ball can hold a surprisingly good percentage of the roots on such trees, albeit, we do recognize that even in the best cases, large amounts of roots are lost in the process of digging/transplanting. There, now that we've completely talked in circles-or at least, I have-let us know where things are at! To be honest, a nursery specializing in native trees and shrubs, utilizing careful attention to genetics, would probably do well in the various sections of the country. I've specified tamaracks-Larix laricina-and northern white cedar-Thuja occidentalis-for a good many "native restoration" projects up here. My contractors occasionally have to go through contortions to source this stuff, even though in the wild, it's everywhere! Ten years ago.......I know what I should have been doing! +oM